An Observance Of Trifles

The Adventure Of Shoscombe Old Place--The Series Finale!

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 21 Feb 2016 13:00:00 +0000

Is this the way Holmes ends--not with a bang but a whimper?

Perhaps that is overstating things. And perhaps we modern readers have been conditioned by modern fiction series to expect not merely a final story, but AN ENDING. And when we don't get that, that sense of closure, we feel cheated.

Which brings us to The Adventure of Shoscombe Old Place.

It's not as if the "series finale" is a new concept. The Fugitive, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, and M*A*S*H are just a few examples of how the concept has been around for awhile.

But these days, it is ubiquitous. It's no longer satisfactory, it seems, to simply leave it to the viewers' imaginations what might have happened to their favorite characters--the producers are obligated to spell it out for them, and tie off every plot line, and answer every question. Genre press and blogs will update their annual "What are the best and worst series' finales ever" lists.

So to modern sensibilities, it's a little bit jarring to see Sherlock Holmes just...end. No big wrap-up. No final statement. Just another story, with nothing too special about it.

Of course, it's not as if Sir Arthur Conan Doyle hadn't already tried to do a "series finale" for his own creation--twice. He killed the detective off in The Final Problem...but it didn't take. And he gave us the "story set in the (series') future that show our heroes' last adventure" in His Last Bow. That, too, turned out not to be particularly final.

So perhaps there's no surprise to be had that Doyle didn't go to that well for a third time--what was left to do in that mode, show Sherlock's funeral? (Or better yet, a diminished Holmes solving his last mystery at Watson's funeral? Say...Someone get me a pen, I gotta start writing this down...).

It's pretty clear that Sir Arthur knew that this was the last story in Case-Book. It was the 12th story since Last Bow, and the collections tended to gather in dozens. Case-Book was published within a few weeks of the publication of Shoscombe.

But did he know that this was to be the last Holmes story of all? There's certainly not any indication of that. It is, not to damn it with faint praise, just another mystery. Watson doesn't even give us the usual "this tale was so fascinating I had to relay it" shtick as an introduction. There's no real villain, certainly not Holmes' ultimate foe or dastardly enemy agents. There's no real crime, which while not necessarily a story defect, doesn't seem to be the note you'd want to retire the world's greatest detective on. The deductions are not particularly brilliant.

Perhaps we'll never know what was in Sir Arthur's mind. Was this just another story, and he planned to pick up Sherlock again later? Or was this his last word, and Doyle just decided not to make a big deal of it, the better to have Holmes fade quietly away?

Whichever, the end of the series hasn't the closure modern genre consumers have come to expect. And really, that's just fine. Now we can just use our imaginations for ourselves. And just like we had to imagine Dick Van Dyke still toiling away on writing for that show, or Napoleon and Ilya still U.N.C.L.E.ing away without us, we can close our eyes and see Sherlock and Watson still in the Victorian fog, solving the thousands of mysteries which Watson has alluded to. Perhaps for these heroes, it's better not to have a definitive ending.

Thanks for reading this humble effort at a blog!

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**Shoscombe may be a mid-level Holmes affair, but literarily it works quite nicely. We have a nice theme of impostors and doubles running throughout--Sir Robert uses an identical horse to fake out touts, and uses a fake sister to forestall his creditors, while Holmes and Watson pose as city-slickers out for some bucolic fishing. And the bones in the furnace are meant to fake us out into thinking that they are Lady Beatrice's.

The whole tale, while ultimately rather slight, is well put together, teasing us with red herrings and surprising plot twists.

**Doyle bringing Holmes into the CSI-future: "Sherlock Holmes had been bending for a long time over a low-power microscope..."'they have begun to realize the importance of the microscope.'"

Little did Doyle know that 80 years later, the airwaves would be filled with nothing but "regular" police using such scientific methods to solve crimes.

**The last two apocryphal cases mentioned:

In the St. Pancras case you may remember that a cap was found beside the dead policeman. The accused man denies that it is his. But he is a picture-frame maker who habitually handles glue.

and

Since I ran down that coiner by the zinc and copper filings in the seam of his cuff they have begun to realize the importance of the microscope.

Interesting that these both come from Holmes, and not Watson.

**Perhaps the most-remembered part of this story: Watson's gambling "problem":

By the way, Watson, you know something of racing?"

"I ought to. I pay for it with about half my wound pension."

I think this was pretty clearly sarcastic exaggeration, not meant to be taken literally. Still, perhaps we now know why, upon his return, Holmes kept Watson's checkbook for him...

**Sir Robert Norberton was clearly a violent, dangerous man:

"Norberton nearly came within your province once.

"How was that?"

"It was when he horsewhipped Sam Brewer, the well-known Curzon Street money-lender, on Newmarket Heath. He nearly killed the man."

And we're told that "[h]e's a terrible man with his fists if he gets started, and no respecter of persons."

And still another person who knows him warns, "But mind what I have told you about Sir Robert. He's the sort that strikes first and speaks afterwards"

So it's hard to understand why, exactly, Sir Robert hasn't done jail time, or at least been sued out of his holdings even before the creditors got to him. He "nearly killed" a man by whipping him--could even a noble get away with that? Maybe Norberten paid to hush it up. Or perhaps Watson (or the press) exaggerated the incident.

Still, despite the fact that he was so violent, Watson cannot believe that a noble would actually commit premeditated murder:

And yet...Let us suppose, Watson -- it is merely a scandalous supposition, a hypothesis put forward for argument's sake -- that Sir Robert has done away with his sister."

"My dear Holmes, it is out of the question."

"Very possibly, Watson. Sir Robert is a man of an honourable stock. But you do occasionally find a carrion crow among the eagles.

A presumption of innocence because of class. Oh, Victorian/Edwardian era, I shall miss you...

**Watson's description of Sir Robert as better suited to a different era is classic:

Well, he has the name of being a dangerous man. He is about the most daredevil rider in England -- second in the Grand National a few years back. He is one of those men who have overshot their true generation. He should have been a buck in the days of the Regency -- a boxer, an athlete, a plunger on the turf, a lover of fair ladies, and, by all account, so far down Queer Street that he may never find his way back again.

**Yes, I know it's picking at low-hanging fruit to mock older slang that has picked up altogether different, risque meanings over the decades. And yes, I know that the phrase merely means that Sir Robert was deeply in debit.

Still, I can't help but emphasize this utterly perfect phrase: "so far down Queer Street that he may never find his way back again." Priceless.

It's also not the only time the queer-word is used for Sir Robert: "Well, sir, when a man does one queer thing, or two queer things, there may be a meaning to it, but when everything he does is queer, then you begin to wonder."

I know, I know. Still, all of that perhaps puts another meaning on "Sir Robert has never married. Just as well, I think, considering his prospects." Maybe it wasn't the prospects that kept him from marrying...

**Sir Robert's living arrangements are considered odd:

He lives with his widowed sister, Lady Beatrice Falder."

"You mean that she lives with him?"

"No, no. The place belonged to her late husband, Sir James. Norberton has no claim on it at all. It is only a life interest and reverts to her husband's brother.

It's another, final look at some of the sexism of the era. If unmarried sibling are living together, even Sherlock assumes that the sister "lives with" the brother--that is, that he is the property holder and source of income, and she the "freeloader." To suggest otherwise? Holmes takes that as an obvious mistake!!

Here, as well, we have yet another case of a woman being used for her inheritance. Perhaps even more egregiously, she's not allowed to keep the estate to pass on--when she passes on, it reverts to the Falder clan.!!

Of course, that's a good way for declining aristocracy to make sure that's what's left of their wealth stays in their family, and isn't redistributed by weddings.

I can only imagine (hope) the will would have been different had Beatrice and her husband had children to pass the estate to. Also, surely her husband recognized Sir Robert's spendthrift nature (and Beatrice's willingness to let it happen), and this was just a means to protect the family wealth from being squandered by a jerk...

**John Mason, head trainer of Sir Robert's horses, is probably the worst client/witness ever!

You'd think that, if you're trying to interest Sherlock Holmes in taking your case, you'd start with the worst evidence first--bones in the furnace!

But no, Mason tries the soft sell: "First of all, Mr. Holmes, I think that my employer, Sir Robert, has gone mad."

Well, Holmes notes that this really isn't his department. But rather than go on to potentially great evils, Mason just embellishes on the madness theory: "Well, first of all, you have only to look at him. I don't believe he sleeps at night. He is down at the stables at all hours. His eyes are wild. It has all been too much for his nerves."

Then Mason moves on...but not to any evidence of foul play! He just segues to the fact that Beatrice is behaving oddly:

Then there is his conduct to Lady Beatrice! They have always been the best of friends. They had the same tastes, the two of them, and she loved the horses as much as he did. Every day at the same hour she would drive down to see them -- and, above all, she loved the Prince. He would prick up his ears when he heard the wheels on the gravel, and he would trot out each morning to the carriage to get his lump of sugar. But that's all over now." "Why?" "Well, she seems to have lost all interest in the horses. For a week now she has driven past the stables with never so much as 'Good-morning'!

So far Mason has only laid out that he thinks Mason mad, and that Beatrice is behaving oddly. Not much call to involve a private detective is there?

Oh, yeah, there's the dog:

"You think there has been a quarrel?"

"And a bitter, savage, spiteful quarrel at that. Why else would he give away her pet spaniel that she loved as if he were her child?"

Still not a lot of interest here, is there? Oh, well then, she's drinking more than she used to!

She is brooding and sulky and drinking, Mr. Holmes -- drinking like a fish."

"Did she drink before this estrangement?"

"Well, she took her glass, but now it is often a whole bottle of an evening. So Stephens, the butler, told me.

Again, Mason has wasted Holmes time (and pages!) without anything particularly dastardly. At best, it looks like a sibling fight. What does he expect Holmes to do about that?

Only then does Mason begin to bring in the Gothic and sinister: "But then, again, what is master doing down at the old church crypt at night? And who is the man that meets him there?"

OK, you now have Holmes' interest. Still, Mason waits to casually drop in the fact that there's grave robbery (or worse) going on: "No, sir, and there is something more that I can't fit in. Why should Sir Robert want to dig up a dead body?" Heavens, talk about burying your lede!

And only after all of that, with Holmes still expressing skepticism about getting involved, does Mason finally reveal the burned skeleton: He took a paper from his pocket, and, unwrapping it carefully, he exposed a charred fragment of bone.

It just seems to me that if you want to convince Sherlock Holmes to get involved, you start with the potential evidence of a potential crime, and then add in the soap opera aspects. But maybe that's just me.

**Sir Robert's plan to keep the odds high in the race:

You can get forties now, but it was nearer the hundred when he began to back him."

"But how is that if the horse is so good?"

"The public don't know how good he is. Sir Robert has been too clever for the touts. He has the Prince's half-brother out for spins. You can't tell 'em apart. But there are two lengths in a furlong between them when it comes to a gallop.

Admit it--when you read that, you were sure that the story was going to be some kind of Silver Blaze reprise, with a horse-switching happening somewhere along the line. That's what I thought...

**I must confess to confusion about the maid, Carrie Evans, and her alleged affair with Sir Robert.

Mason, despite his claims to discretion, quite clearly implies that the affair is well-known and long-lived:

"There is her maid, Carrie Evans. She has been with her this five years."

"And is, no doubt, devoted?"

Mr. Mason shuffled uncomfortably. "She's devoted enough," he answered at last. "But I won't say to whom." "Ah!" said Holmes. "I can't tell tales out of school.

...

"Well, the scandal has been pretty clear for a long time."

It would have been hard for Mason to confirm the affair more firmly, uncomfortable shuffling or not.

And yet...Norberton hires Carrie's husband to carry out the impersonation of Beatrice!!

Carrie, for whatever reason, has been living under her maiden name!! So maybe Mason didn't even realize she was married!!

So was there an affair? If there was, perhaps Mr. Norlett didn't know about it? But Mason sure seems to imply that it was common knowledge.

Or perhaps there was an affair, and Norlett did know, and cooperated anyway. Maybe Sir Robert promised him a handsome payday for his cooperation, and all he had to do was turn his head. The rich really are different, you see.

So was Mason completely wrong about the affair? Or was there, and Mr. Norlett behaved in a fairly unbelievable way? And why even introduce this into the story? Just to give Sir Robert a (far-fetched at best) motive for murder?

**The Granada adaptation changes things around a bit, so stable boy played by a very young Jude Law impersonates Lady Beatrice:

Oh, Jude....

**Another reason Mason should have started with crypt robbing and mysterious bones, as Holmes says, "It is only the colourless, uneventful case which is hopeless."

**Sherlock declares that "Dogs don't make mistakes."

Well, I've known some pretty damn dumb dogs in my day. And even the smartest ones aren't that hard to fool...

**Our first actual view of Sir Robert: He was a terrible figure, huge in stature and fierce in manner. A large stable-lantern which he held in front of him shone upward upon a strong, heavily moustached face and angry eyes...

**Apparently, death did not flatter lady Beatrice:

He turned and tore open the coffin-lid behind him. In the glare of the lantern I saw a body swathed in a sheet from head to foot with dreadful, witch-like features, all nose and chin, projecting at one end, the dim, glazed eyes staring from a discoloured and crumbling face.

**Holmes: "In any case, my business is that of every other good citizen -- to uphold the law."

Hahahaha!! How many thieves and murderers have you let walk away, Sherlock?!? And that's just in the stories we know about!!

**OK, I have to admit that I'm confused by some of the finances here.

We're told that Sir Robert has hocked everything in a desperate attempt to win the race and save his financial situation from ruin. And we're told that when Beatrice dies, the estate reverts back to her husband's family.

But Sir Robert says, "I have always known that if my sister were to die my creditors would be on to my estate like a flock of vultures. Everything would be seized -- my stables, my horses -- everything."

Wait...wouldn't that property revert to the Falders? It's not "his" estate, right? If the stables and the horses were part of the estate, wouldn't they go to the Falders, as well?

I'll confess freely that I'm no financial expert, and have no idea whether the creditors would be able to step in before probate or have to wait until after. But since none of the estate belonged to Sir Robert, it seems to my untrained mind that the estate would revert to the Falders, and the creditors would have to go after them to seize the horses, etc.

Again, we have incomplete information, but if Sir Robert had invested "everything" on the horse race, his only asset the creditors could go after would be his actual bets.

Holmes disagrees. "Your bets on the race, and therefore your hopes for the future, would hold good even if your creditors seized your estate."

Well, wait. If I borrowed thousand of dollars, and put it all into lottery tickets, and then when bankrupt before the drawing...wouldn't the creditors be entitled to those tickets, as an asset with potential value? It seems wrong to say that I could default on my debts, but walk away with the tickets and become a millionaire, and the creditors couldn't touch me.

**So, no real crime was committed here (putting aside whatever minor laws about notifying authorities or properly treating dead bodies might have existed). So, no harm, no foul, right, Sherlock?

Hardly. Holmes gets mighty judgy here:

"There was no indignity or irreverence, Mr. Holmes. I do not feel that I have wronged the dead."

"Your conduct seems to me inexcusable, Sir Robert."

Wow. Worse than the murderers and adulterers and thieves you've let off the hook?

"Well, Sir Robert," said Holmes, rising, "this matter must, of course, be referred to the police. It was my duty to bring the facts to light, and there I must leave it. As to the morality or decency of your conduct, it is not for me to express an opinion."

I think you have expressed you opinion adequately, Holmes...

**Watson tells us that thee was a happy ending:

It is generally known now that this singular episode ended upon a happier note than Sir Robert's actions deserved. Shoscombe Prince did win the Derby, the sporting owner did net eighty thousand pounds in bets, and the creditors did hold their hand until the race was over, when they were paid in full, and enough was left to reestablish Sir Robert in a fair position in life.

Watson neglects to tell us whether or not he bet any of his wound pension on the race...

**Apparently, the authorities were not nearly so morally outraged as Holmes:

Both police and coroner took a lenient view of the transaction, and beyond a mild censure for the delay in registering the lady's decease, the lucky owner got away scatheless from this strange incident in a career which has now outlived its shadows and promises to end in an honoured old age.

It seems that, over time, Sir Robert mended his violent ways, and his spendthrift ways, and...Money really does change everything!

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--???

The Adventure of The Veiled Lodger--Sherlock's Quantum Of Solace?

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 24 Jan 2016 13:00:00 +0000

The James Bond short story Quantum Of Solace involves Bond listening as the governor of the Bahamas relates a tale about the tragic romantic history of a couple he once knew. That's it--Bond just listens to someone else's story. No spycraft or adventure for 007 whatsoever. It's not a bad story--indeed, it's pretty good--but it's really not a James Bond story, if you know what I mean.

Which brings us to The Adventure Of The Veiled Lodger.

The crux of Veiled Lodger is just Holmes sitting and listening to the tragic story of our mysterious woman. There is no mystery at all, no deductions to be had. Sherlock just hears her tale of woe, and offers her a bit of advice. He might as well have been a priest. It's a good enough story, but it's not really a Sherlock Holmes story, if you know what I mean.

Which leaves me frighteningly little to right about here.

Fortunately, the good doctor has rescued us. For, while this may not be much of a mystery, and not your standard Sherlock Holmes story, Watson provides us plenty of meat in this amazingly dense first paragraph:

When one considers that Mr. Sherlock Holmes was in active practice for twenty-three years, and that during seventeen of these I was allowed to cooperate with him and to keep notes of his doings, it will be clear that I have a mass of material at my command. The problem has always been not to find but to choose. There is the long row of year-books which fill a shelf and there are the dispatch-cases filled with documents, a perfect quarry for the student not only of crime but of the social and official scandals of the late Victorian era. Concerning these latter, I deprecate, however, in the strongest way the attempts which have been made lately to get at and to destroy these papers. The source of these outrages is known, and if they are repeated I have Mr. Holmes's authority for saying that the whole story concerning the politician, the lighthouse, and the trained cormorant will be given to the public. There is at least one reader who will understand.

Well, there are a number of juicy morsels there. What can we unpack?

Let's start with Watson's comment of the length of their partnership:

When one considers that Mr. Sherlock Holmes was in active practice for twenty-three years, and that during seventeen of these I was allowed to cooperate with him and to keep notes of his doings...

Lots of good fodder there for chronologists and players of The Great Game.

I'll leave it to others to argue about when "active practice" started, or what stories count as part of that, or what this tells us about Watson's absences and marriage(s). Do the adventures during the Interregnum count as the active practice? What about the two years he spent building up to His Last Bow? Ohm the headaches...

What is interesting to me is that, while Holmes was in "active practice" for 23 years, Watson/Doyle published stories of that practice for 41 years, or nearly twice the length of Sherlock's career!

From another angle: doesn't 23 years seem rather short for Holmes' career? At least by modern standards, one finishes college and perhaps grad school at, let's say an average of age 25. Then you work until you retire. Which for most people would mean an active practice of 35-40 years (albeit often not at the same job). Which makes Holmes' 23 years seem surprisingly small.

Still, we shouldn't necessarily judge by modern standards. Life spans were shorter then, and retirement may have come early. Doyle never gives us a clear idea of Holmes' age when we first meet him. Stamford certainly seems to think that Holmes is a student; but that doesn't necessarily tell us much, as Sherlock may have been a "professional student," staying in college for years gathering his eclectic knowledge without approaching the normal degree path. And we're certainly not clear on his age when he retired. Perhaps he didn't retire because of old age, but because of ill health, or boredom, or sufficient wealth not to have to work, or the desire to get out of the city he spoke about in Lion's Mane. A late start to his "active practice," an early retirement, knock out 3 years for the Interregnum...you could just about argue 23 years. Still feels short, though...

As to the matter of how much material Watson has...

...it will be clear that I have a mass of material at my command. The problem has always been not to find but to choose. There is the long row of year-books which fill a shelf and there are the dispatch-cases filled with documents, a perfect quarry for the student not only of crime but of the social and official scandals of the late Victorian era.

Given that Watson has spoken of hundreds, if not thousands, of untold cases, well, that has to be an awful lot of material there.

Of course, it's practically required for any pastiche to begin with an "editor's" introduction explaining how some of those papers came into their possession--inheritance, estate sale, hidden compartments in old homes they just purchased--thus justifying the story as "real."

The real problem with that idea is that Watson never tells us that he has completed stories just laying around--just year books and documents. In fact, several times John has told us that he has to go back and refer to his notes when Sherlock has given him permission to write up an old case. These untold cases haven't been written up yet--which puts paid to any claims to anyone claiming to have found completed manuscripts written by Watson in those newly discovered dispatch cases! At best they would have found newspaper clipping and notes. Don't be fooled!!

Still, these year-books and dispatch cases full of documents are irresistible, aren't they? As he says, they form a record of late Victorian life, of crime and scandal and society. We've already been given such a glimpse of that era through the 60 stories we have...just think how much more we could learn with access to all of Watson's files!

Alas, it was not to be:

...I may say that the writers of agonized letters, who beg that the honour of their families or the reputation of famous forebears may not be touched, have nothing to fear. The discretion and high sense of professional honour which have always distinguished my friend are still at work in the choice of these memoirs, and no confidence will be abused.

Damn you and your discretion, Watson!!

Of course, we can question how legitimate those requests for privacy are. By Victorian standards, a relative suffering from a rare disease was seen as bringing great shame upon a family. Women who had written indiscreet letter before they even met their husbands were driven to insane lengths to "protect their honour" and cover up their past, as if they were expected to have been emotional as well as physical virgins before they wed.

So by our standards, a lot of the "honour" and "reputation" used to justify covering up these tales would surely be trivial. Not only that, but now you're protecting the reputation of forebears? Come on now, John and Sherlock--surely the records of your cases are far more important that the world learning that some upper-class twit was a twit!!

But some people go beyond begging:

Concerning these latter, I deprecate, however, in the strongest way the attempts which have been made lately to get at and to destroy these papers. The source of these outrages is known, and if they are repeated I have Mr. Holmes's authority for saying that the whole story concerning the politician, the lighthouse, and the trained cormorant will be given to the public. There is at least one reader who will understand.

Whoa!! Watson is laying down some serious smack there!! Veiled threats directed at a reader! Mysterious attempts to steal Watson's papers! Allusion to an insane sounding apocryphal case!! Holy crap!! There's a whole story there, just in someone's attempts to suppress a story that Watson had no intention of telling!! Egads!!

Well, that's an awful lot to digest from one paragraph. Unfortunately, that's about it, as we now transition to Sherlock not solving a mystery or making any deductions, but just listening to a woman's confession. "But the most terrible human tragedies were often involved in those cases which brought him the fewest personal opportunities, and it is one of these which I now desire to record," Watson tells us. Quantum of solace, indeed...

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**Watson on this story: "In telling it, I have made a slight change of name and place, but otherwise the facts are as stated."

How many other lion attacks were there in England?? How many circus owners killed by their show beasts.

Unless you changed the species of the animal involved, it doesn't seem like it would have been too hard for Watson's interested readers to track down the "real" story, discretion be damned.

**Holmes is in high humor:

When I arrived I found [Holmes] seated in a smoke-laden atmosphere...

"Mrs. Merrilow does not object to tobacco, Watson, if you wish to indulge your filthy habits.

**Holmes: "You will understand, Mrs. Merrilow, that if I come to Mrs. Ronder I should prefer to have a witness."

Why?

**Let's build the Gothic terror:

"You say that Mrs. Ronder has been your lodger for seven years and that you have only once seen her face."

"And I wish to God I had not!" said Mrs. Merrilow. "It was, I understand, terribly mutilated."

"Well, Mr. Holmes, you would hardly say it was a face at all. That's how it looked."

**Mrs. Ronder had some money:

"Did she give references when she came?"

"No, sir, but she gave hard cash, and plenty of it. A quarter's rent right down on the table in advance and no arguing about terms. In these times a poor woman like me can't afford to turn down a chance like that."

Let's remember that a little further on, shall we...?

**More terror building:

She seems to be wasting away. And there's something terrible on her mind. 'Murder!' she cries. 'Murder!' And once I heard her: 'You cruel beast! You monster!' she cried.

**Mrs. Merrilow counseling her boarder to find some help: 'Mrs. Ronder,' I says, 'if you have anything that is troubling your soul, there's the clergy,' I says, 'and there's the police. Between them you should get some help.'

Perhaps there's something in the middle of those two options?

**When Mrs. Merrilow suggests Sherlock Holmes: 'That's the man,' says she. 'I wonder I never thought of it before.'

Perhaps because no one would think of a famous detective as a confessor where no detection was involved?

**The terrible crime scene:

Ronder lay, with the back of his head crushed in and deep claw-marks across his scalp, some ten yards from the cage, which was open. Close to the door of the cage lay Mrs. Ronder upon her back, with the creature squatting and snarling above her. It had torn her face in such a fashion that it was never thought that she could live.

**Holmes actually admiring a policeman: "...young Edmunds, of the Berkshire Constabulary. A smart lad that!"

**Mrs. Merrilow perhaps isn't the good Samaritan the beginning of the tale would have us think:

It was very clear that her chief preoccupation was lest she should lose a valuable lodger, and she implored us, before showing us up, to say and do nothing which could lead to so undesirable an end.

**Watson waxing lyrical: "From keeping beasts in a cage, the woman seemed, by some retribution of fate, to have become herself a beast in a cage."

**"She sat now in a broken armchair in the shadowy corner of the room."

What, the well-paid landlady can repair or replace a chair for her only boarder?

**Why had Ronder lied to the police? "Because the fate of someone else depended upon it. I know that he was a very worthless being, and yet I would not have his destruction upon my conscience. We had been so close -- so close!"

Not to be too indelicate, but perhaps the reason she lied is because she were a participant in a plot that successfully murdered your husband? That seems slightly less altruistic than she's trying to present it, right?

**More from Eugenia: "I could not stand the scandal and publicity which would come from a police examination. I have not long to live, but I wish to die undisturbed."

Lady...you MURDERED another human being. One would think that avoiding scandal and publicity would be the least of your concerns...as opposed to avoiding the gallows!

**Ronder: "And yet I wanted to find one man of judgment to whom I could tell my terrible story, so that when I am gone all might be understood."

Holmes is an odd choice for that role, isn't he? He's known for solving crimes, yet she's seeking absolution.

"That when I am gone" might suggest that Watson waited until her death to publish this account--which perhaps means she lived another 30 years.

**Watson still hung up on physical corruption representing spiritual corruption, and vice versa: "Ronder was a huge porcine person and that his wife was a very magnificent woman." And:

It was a dreadful face -- a human pig, or rather a human wild boar, for it was formidable in its bestiality. One could imagine that vile mouth champing and foaming in its rage, and one could conceive those small, vicious eyes darting pure malignancy as they looked forth upon the world. Ruffian, bully, beast -- it was all written on that heavy-jowled face.

It's interesting, then, that Watson didn't make the same leap to suggest that Eugenia's facial injuries were a reflection of her role as a murderess...

**"When I became a woman this man loved me, if such lust as his can be called love, and in an evil moment I became his wife."

Not sure by what she means "an evil moment," unless she means that her own "lust" caused her to say yes to his proposal...

**Eugenia on her co-conspirator: "Compared to my husband he seemed like the angel Gabriel. He pitied me and helped me, till at last our intimacy turned to love -- deep, deep, passionate love, such love as I had dreamed of but never hoped to feel."

Apparently a one-sided love, as Leonardo ran--and even after Eugenia lied for him and he was in the clear, he abandoned her...

**The moment that happens in every noir film: "Soon my lover and I understood that it could not be avoided. My husband was not fit to live. We planned that he should die."

I'm in no way defending Ronder's treatment of his wife. And the draconian divorce laws of the era limited her options.

But couldn't Eugenia and Ronder just have taken off? As two people who left a traveling circus troupe, it's hard to see that the police would have spent much time hunting for her, even if the "porcine" husband filed a complaint. And there are plenty of places--even other countries--they could have gone to to live in bliss and safety.

So why not leave, instead of stooping to cold-blooded murder?

**A cunning plan:

We made a club -- Leonardo made it -- and in the leaden head he fastened five long steel nails, the points outward, with just such a spread as the lion's paw. This was to give my husband his death-blow, and yet to leave the evidence that it was the lion which we would loose who had done the deed.

It worked well enough to fool local coroners and constabulary...

**The flaw in the cunning plan:

You may have heard how quick these creatures are to scent human blood, and how it excites them. Some strange instinct had told the creature in one instant that a human being had been slain. As I slipped the bars it bounded out and was on me in an instant.

Oops.

The sad part is, that even if the lion hadn't turned on them, the poor guy likely would have been destroyed anyway, framed as a "man-killer." At least this way, he got a little of his own back.

**The "deep, deep passionate love" of her life:

Leonardo could have saved me. If he had rushed forward and struck the beast with his club he might have cowed it. But the man lost his nerve. I heard him shout in his terror, and then I saw him turn and fly.

**So what does a mauled circus widow do?

I had but one desire, Mr. Holmes, and I had enough money to gratify it. It was that I should cover myself so that my poor face should be seen by none, and that I should dwell where none whom I had ever known should find me.

**Go back to that line: "I had enough money to gratify it."

According to Eugenia herself, she started as a "poor circus girl." Now, she has "money enough" to gratify her wishes, and "plenty of hard cash" to throw at her landlady.

That's one detail that Mrs. Ronder omits from this tale--because the death of her husband was declared an accident, she inherited his money and property (and perhaps insurance money?). The murder left her well-off enough to fulfill her desires--although admittedly they might have been better desires had she not been mauled.

So there's the motive that hasn't been shared with us, and the probable reason Eugenia and Leonardo went straight to murder instead of flight as their first option: the money.

**Holmes, though, seems fooled: "Poor girl!" he said. "Poor girl! The ways of fate are indeed hard to understand. If there is not some compensation hereafter, then the world is a cruel jest."

**Again, why she didn't turn in Leonardo: "He had left me under the beast's claws, he had deserted me in my need, and yet I could not bring myself to give him to the gallows."

Damned conveniently, lying to the police also spared herself the gallows...but surely that never entered her thinking, did it?

**Of course, perhaps Holmes did figure all this out. After all, I'm not making any of this up--all is this is straight from Watson's narrative, even if he doesn't give it the interpretation I do. Surely Holmes saw the same things?

It's not the first time he has let a wife go unmolested for the death of an abusive husband. But unlike Abbey Grange, there's no plausible way that this incident can be written off as merely an "accident." Eugenia by her own words admitted to enthusiastically and successfully participating in a plan to murder her husband.

Perhaps Holmes felt the disfigurement was punishment enough. Or that enough time had passed, and no good could come of making it a police matter. Or maybe...

**Holmes, sensing that Eugenia is planning suicide:

"Your life is not your own," he said. "Keep your hands off it."

"What use is it to anyone?"

"How can you tell? The example of patient suffering is in itself the most precious of all lessons to an impatient world."

A very Catholic attitude.

But then again, we know she was no mere "patient sufferer," but ultimately the author of her own pain.

There's nothing to support this reading, and it's likely not in character, but part of me likes to think that while Holmes didn't think she any longer deserved civil punishment, he felt she should remain alive, to suffer with her guilt and bad dreams. But that's just me projecting, in all likelihood.

**Watson on her terrible injuries:

It was horrible. No words can describe the framework of a face when the face itself is gone. Two living and beautiful brown eyes looking sadly out from that grisly ruin did but make the view more awful.

**Eugenia relinquishes her poison:

"'I send you my temptation. I will follow your advice.' That was the message. I think, Watson, we can guess the name of the brave woman who sent it."

Brave woman? Please....

That also makes two stories in a row with people carrying around cyanide. How easy was that stuff to get in those days??

**I suppose you can tell that I'm not terribly sympathetic to Eugenia.

Not to minimize her torment before the killing (assuming it was real, as we only have her word for it), but my more modern sensibilities can't help but read this like a classic noir, be it Double Indemnity or Body Heat. A woman takes a lover, dupes him into killing her husband for the money, and the dumps the guy. In this case, of course, she's the one who suffers for her crime, not the dupe...but the injuries from the lion were essentially self-inflicted, a punishment for her crimes. Murder will out, even if the bastard had it coming.

Or perhaps I'm just a lot more hard-hearted than Holmes and Watson (and Doyle).

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF SHOSCOMBE OLD PLACE!!

The Adventure Of The Retired Colourman--Paint-By-Numbers Mystery With One Colour Missing?

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 03 Jan 2016 13:00:00 +0000

The Adventure Of The Retired Colourman is not a bad set-up for a story.

But in too many ways, it doesn't go beyond the set-up, the basic sketch. The story has a few good things going for it, but it feels like there a lot of details missing, a lot of necessary connective tissue to make us care about the mystery.

Take, for example, our victims. Let's start with the wife, uh...umm...well....she's never even named in the story!!

That's not all that unusual for Doyle--he has a bad habit of not naming wives, sometimes, as if they're just adjuncts of their husbands. The era, and sexism, and all.

But in this case, it's also indicative that after Sir Arthur came up with the killer and how he did it, the rest of the backstory was too much to be bothered with.

What of Mrs. Amberley, then? We're told that Josiah retired at 61, and one year later married "a woman twenty years younger than himself." So she's presumably in her forties. Why does a woman like woman marry a man like Josiah? Did she have no idea what an abusive miser he was? Did he somehow manage to fool her? He certainly, as Holmes said, "has few outward graces, whatever his inner virtues may be." Or was this a marriage of convenience? Perhaps she was recently widowed, with no means of support, and any port in a storm? Maybe he promised to take care of her family's debts if she married him?

Without understanding why she married him, and what the basis of their relationship was, it's hard to judge the state of their marriage, and whether she was likely to have had an affair. Remember, everything we know about Mrs. Amberley comes to us third hand. Perhaps most importantly, it comes to us through a mind so unbalanced that Holmes believes he may belong in an asylum and not the gallows.

Despite this, Holmes seems to accept all of Josiah's accusations at face value. "Ernest was frequently in the house, and an intimacy between him and Mrs. Amberley was a natural sequence"? "So also is it that young Dr. Ernest, an unmarried man, played chess with Amberley, and probably played the fool with his wife."? Given what we know of Josiah after the case is over, isn't it just as likely that either he is lying, or it is all in his paranoid imagination?

Not that it necessarily matters--even if she was having an affair, that hardly justifies her murder, particularly in such a gruesome fashion. But without victim-shaming, it is important to know what drove the killer. Was she fooling around with Dr. Ernest, or was Josiah just foolishly jealous over nothing? A cold-blooded murderer, or truly insane?

The same applies to Dr. Ernest. What do we know about him? He plays chess. End of story.

We're told that Josiah "made his wife so wretched by his niggardly ways that she was a ready prey for any adventurer." An adventurer? A doctor who goes to play Josiah at chess--at Josiah's invitation--qualifies as "an adventurer?"

How about Ernest's looks? Age? Type of doctor? Disposition? Any history of wooing wedded women (and fleeing with her husband's fortune)? As Holmes asked, "Was he the gay Lothario one would expect?" Again, there is no actual evidence shown to confirm Amberley's accusations. Holmes claims that "the opinion of the neighbours" is enough to "confirm" Josiah's story, but come now--that's also getting your story third or fourth-hand. The detective is willing to put local gossip above actual evidence? Pshaw. Even after Amberley has been caught, and Holmes declaims on the level of his madness, he is still willing to declare "so also is it that young Dr. Ernest, an unmarried man, played chess with Amberley, and probably played the fool with his wife." That is truly unsupported by anything except the claims of a murdering madman and local gossips. We expect Holmes to make such declarations based on actual evidence.

Oh, and Dr. Ernest's family was willing to hire a detective to investigate his disappearance, which is at least one indication that those close to Ernest didn't believe Josiah's calumny. (There's no indication that Mrs. Amberly's family did the same, but then again, we don't know anything whatsoever about her, including whether she had family).

And it should be emphasized--even if we believed that Ernest and Mrs. Amberly were having an affair, there is even less evidence that they planned to abscond with any money or securities. Holmes often proclaims that he seeks justice--well, in this case, he should have spent some time securing justify for the slandered victims of an insane murderer.

Some of these details could have been--should have been--explored. It would have been easy to make the story a bit longer (it is very short), or if necessary, to spend less time on Watson and Amberley's amusing but overly-long trip to the hinterlands.

But without this information, how can we understand the murderer? What about Josiah? Was he truly justified in his fears of an affair? Again, not that that would excuse homicide--but it would broaden our portrait of the character. Had he been married previously, and cuckolded before? If his jealousy could reach the point of a "frantic mania," why invite Ernest into his home? Was he, in his madness, trying to "test" her loyalty?

There are also some inconsistencies in Sir Arthur's portrayal of Josiah. He is such a good actor that he completely fools Watson and Holmes on his first visit. But later, he does nothing but complain about following any investigative path, when an innocent victim would have been eager to follow up any such "clues." He has the "swank" (we Americans would say "balls") to beard the lion in his den, and go to Sherlock Holmes to "solve" his wife's "disappearance." But the first time that someone mentions that he's a suspect, he tries to commit suicide? Someone so arrogant as to think he could best Holmes wouldn't be carrying around cyanide pills, because he wouldn't be able to conceive of being caught--at least that's how my armchair psychology reads it.

So we have a chilling murder, and an interesting (if confusing) murderer. But by completely ignoring the victims, and not properly examining the truth of the killer's claim, Doyle weakened leaves some of the colours out of this mystery's palette. It's an incomplete picture, which does disservice to the victims (and the readers), and ultimately makes the murderer himself less interesting.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**Welcome back, John Watson. You've been missed!!

**Geez, Sherlock, cheer up a bit! "Exactly, Watson. Pathetic and futile. But is not all life pathetic and futile? Is not his story a microcosm of the whole? We reach. We grasp. And what is left in our hands at the end? A shadow. Or worse than a shadow -- misery."

Sounds like someone needs some drugs...

**Scotland Yard has a habit of foisting of low priority cases upon Holmes?

He has been sent on by the Yard. Just as medical men occasionally send their incurables to a quack. They argue that they can do nothing more, and that whatever happens the patient can be no worse than he is.

So how, then, can they complain about Holmes "stealing the glory" and taking credit for cases?

**Amberley must have been a pretty good actor, as Holmes seems to be taking his claims at face value: "The old story, Watson. A treacherous friend and a fickle wife."

**The real crime? "What is more, the faithless spouse carried off the old man's deed-box as her personal luggage with a good part of his life's savings within." Mess with his heart, but not his money!

Contrast with Three Gables, where Holmes says more and more poeple are using banks now, and not hiding their money on the premises.

I guess that didn't apply to paranoid misers...

**It's good to be needed:

"What will you do about it?"

"Well, the immediate question, my dear Watson, happens to be, What will you do? -- if you will be good enough to understudy me.

**Apocryphal case: "You know that I am preoccupied with this case of the two Coptic Patriarchs, which should come to a head to-day. I really have not time to go out to Lewisham,"

**Swank: "The old fellow was quite insistent that I should go." Just think about that. Amberley was so confident that he actually wanted Sherlock Holmes to examine the scene of the crime.

**Watson: "I set forth to Lewisham, little dreaming that within a week the affair in which I was engaging would be the eager debate of all England."

What's to debate? I suppose whether Amberley gets a straight jacket or the noose...

**See, this is why we missed Watson:

Holmes lay with his gaunt figure stretched in his deep chair, his pipe curling forth slow wreaths of acrid tobacco, while his eyelids drooped over his eyes so lazily that he might almost have been asleep were it not that at any halt or questionable passage of my narrative they half lifted, and two gray eyes, as bright and keen as rapiers, transfixed me with their searching glance.

There's no way we would have gotten that same kind of self-description from Holmes as narrator...

**"The Haven is the name of Mr. Josiah Amberley's house."

I really think I missed out, growing up in an era where houses have numbers, not names. Or was that only a British thing? Do they still do that?

Maybe I'll just rechristen my apartment. From henceforth, I shall call my domicile "The Glade." Now I just have to explain it to the mailman...

**Holmes is not of fan of having to listen to Watson's detailed descriptions of architecture:

"I think it would interest you, Holmes. It is like some penurious patrician who has sunk into the company of his inferiors. You know that particular quarter, the monotonous brick streets, the weary suburban highways. Right in the middle of them, a little island of ancient culture and comfort, lies this old home, surrounded by a high sun-baked wall mottled with lichens and topped with moss, the sort of wall --"

"Cut out the poetry, Watson," said Holmes severely. "I note that it was a high brick wall."

**Our mysterious stalker is first seen:

He was a tall, dark, heavily moustached, rather military-looking man. He nodded in answer to my inquiry and gave me a curiously questioning glance, which came back to my memory a little later...It was undoubtedly the tall, dark man whom I had addressed in the street. I saw him once more at London Bridge, and then I lost him in the crowd. But I am convinced that he was following me."

"No doubt! No doubt!" said Holmes. "A tall, dark, heavily moustached man, you say, with gray-tinted sun-glasses?"

"Holmes, you are a wizard. I did not say so, but he had gray-tinted sun-glasses."

"And a Masonic tie-pin?"

"Holmes!"

Some have complained that it would a violation of rules for a Mason to wear his pin where it could be seen by the public. But if that were true, how would anyone outside of the group ever know what the pin looked like in the first place?

More seriously, that's part of the disguise, the superfluous detail that, while perhaps not strictly accurate, distracts the witness...

**There seems to be a lot of confusion among commentators about Barker, and that Holmes' statements seem to contradict themselves.

Nonsense. Although we not presented the information on Baarker in a proper chronological order, so the reader has to do a little bit of lifting for himself, it's all their, and not contradictory.. Allow me to help.

Holmes: "You had not met Barker, Watson. He is my hated rival upon the Surrey shore." The "hated rival" is a bit facetious, as Sherlock later describes Mr. Barker as "my friend and rival." He's been successful, and Scotland Yard is well acquainted with him: "He has several good cases to his credit, has he not, Inspector?"

Ernest's family hired Barker to look into the doctor's disappearance, so he and Holmes were on the same case, just from different ends: "He has been interesting himself also in your business, Mr. Josiah Amberley, though we have been working independently."

Once they stumbled upon each other, "Of course, I told him how matters stood and we continued the case together."

So when Holmes says, "as to Barker, he has done nothing save what I told him," he's referring to the conduct of this particular case, not his entire career.

Barker is a friendly rival detective, they both ended up working the same case, and this one time they decided to pool their efforts. No confusion at all, really.

There, was that so hard?

**Wait, so Barker operated "upon the Surrey shore?" Is he still there when Holmes retires? Does he consult Holmes on cases?

Or, with the vacuum from Holmes' retirement, has Barker moved his operation to London?

**Watson (and Doyle) continue to adhere to the "moral deformity must be echoed by physical deformity" school of literature:

"He seemed to me like a man who was literally bowed down by care. His back was curved as though he carried a heavy burden. Yet he was not the weakling that I had at first imagined, for his shoulders and chest have the framework of a giant, though his figure tapers away into a pair of spindled legs."

"Left shoe wrinkled, right one smooth."

"I did not observe that."

"No, you wouldn't. I spotted his artificial limb. But proceed."

Seriously, how could he not be a bad guy?

**Watson's thought on the role of Victorian women:

I have never seen a worse-kept place. The garden was all running to seed, giving me an impression of wild neglect in which the plants had been allowed to find the way of Nature rather than of art. How any decent woman could have tolerated such a state of things, I don't know.

Of course, how a "decent woman" is expected to an estate in good repair when her husband is a miser might be the question you should be asking, John.

Of course, deeper commentary about how decent women not allowing plants "to find the way of Nature" and the metaphor of "nature" being a bad thing is invited here, but I'll leave that to others.

**The husband doth protest too much, methinks:

And human nature, Dr. Watson -- the black ingratitude of it all! When did I ever refuse one of her requests? Was ever a woman so pampered? And that young man -- he might have been my own son. He had the run of my house. And yet see how they have treated me! Oh, Dr. Watson, it is a dreadful, dreadful world!'

Well, at least he didn't go on about it forever..."That was the burden of his song for an hour or more..." Oh.

**Holmes tempers his usual criticism of Watson:

It is true that though in your mission you have missed everything of importance, yet even those things which have obtruded themselves upon your notice give rise to serious thought."

"What have I missed?"

"Don't be hurt, my dear fellow. You know that I am quite impersonal. No one else would have done better. Some possibly not so well."

High praise from Sherlock.

**Holmes has adjusted quite well to the existence of telephones: "Thanks to the telephone and the help of the Yard, I can usually get my essentials without leaving this room."

Wait until he sees the internet...

**Amberley begins to break character:

"It's perfectly absurd, Mr. Holmes," he said. "What can this man possibly know of what has occurred? It is waste of time and money."

"It would make the worst possible impression both on the police and upon myself, Mr. Amberley, if when so obvious a clue arose you should refuse to follow it up. We should feel that you were not really in earnest in this investigation."

Our client seemed horrified at the suggestion. "Why, of course I shall go if you look at it in that way," said he.

Obviously, the man who really wanted to find his wife (and his money) wouldn't turn up his nose at a clue like this.

The BBC 1965 adaptation sweetens the pot here , by telling us that Mrs. Amberley had a sister in the area of Little Purlington, thus making a communication from the area vicar not completely random and unlikely...

**Obviously, at this point Holmes is fairly convinced Amberley is guilty: "Whatever you do, see that he really does go," said he. "Should he break away or return, get to the nearest telephone exchange and send the single word 'Bolted.' I will arrange here that it shall reach me wherever I am."

Of course, it's difficult to believe that this direction doesn't tell Watson what the game is. Let's just write that up to authorial discretion, and trying to preserve the mystery until the end of the story.

**Watson's road trip from hell:

My remembrance of the journey is not a pleasant one, for the weather was hot, the train slow, and my companion sullen and silent, hardly talking at all save to make an occasional sardonic remark as to the futility of our proceedings. When we at last reached the little station it was a two-mile drive before we came to the Vicarage.

Holmes was surely laughing at how perfectly remote his choice of ruse was.

**Elman the Vicar is rather a douche:

A big, solemn, rather pompous clergyman received us in his study. Our telegram lay before him.

"Well, gentlemen," he asked, "what can I do for you?"

"We came," I explained, "in answer to your wire."

"My wire! I sent no wire."

"I mean the wire which you sent to Mr. Josiah Amberley about his wife and his money."

"If this is a joke, sir, it is a very questionable one," said the vicar angrily. "I have never heard of the gentleman you name, and I have not sent a wire to anyone."

Our client and I looked at each other in amazement. "Perhaps there is some mistake," said I; "are there perhaps two vicarages? Here is the wire itself, signed Elman and dated from the Vicarage."

"There is only one vicarage, sir, and only one vicar, and this wire is a scandalous forgery, the origin of which shall certainly be investigated by the police. Meanwhile, I can see no possible object in prolonging this interview."

What a self-important prig. Sure it's an inconvenience, this mistaken meeting, but what would it cost you to be polite to people come to seek your aid? Some man of God...

**By the way...would a forged telegram really be a police matter, as long as there was no attempt at defrauding someone of money or property?

**Miser: "It was soon apparent to me that my companion's reputation as a miser was not undeserved. He had grumbled at the expense of the journey, had insisted upon travelling third-class, and was now clamorous in his objections to the hotel bill."

**The big reveal:

But we both have the same question to ask you!"

Mr. Amberley sat down heavily. He sensed impending danger. I read it in his straining eyes and his twitching features. "What is the question, Mr. Holmes?"

"Only this: What did you do with the bodies?

**Great moments in over-acting:

The man sprang to his feet with a hoarse scream. He clawed into the air with his bony hands. His mouth was open, and for the instant he looked like some horrible bird of prey. In a flash we got a glimpse of the real Josiah Amberley, a misshapen demon with a soul as distorted as his body.

Seriously, he was a good enough actor to convince Holmes (initially) of the truth of his story. But at the first word of doubt he completely loses it?

**I mentioned this above, but it bears repeating:

As he fell back into his chair he clapped his hand to his lips as if to stifle a cough. Holmes sprang at his throat like a tiger and twisted his face towards the ground. A white pellet fell from between his gasping lips. "No short cuts, Josiah Amberley. Things must be done decently and in order."

Someone as arrogant and calculating as Amberley just doesn't strike me as the type who would throw in the towel at the first doubting word. That kind never believes they could lose, so they never prepare for defeat. Holmes described him as "He felt so clever and so sure of himself that he imagined no one could touch him." That doesn't seem like someone who would end his own life at the first setback.

I could see suicide later, in his cell. But to carry around a pill means planning to be caught, and that's not how I read Josiah. Then again, crazy is crazy, so...?

Not to mention, Holmes has not yet presented a single piece of evidence against him. He just says, essentially, "I think you did it." And Josiah immediately gives up?

**Holmes being a bit cavalier about civil rights and the like:

The irregulars are useful sometimes, you know. You, for example, with your compulsory warning about whatever he said being used against him, could never have bluffed this rascal into what is virtually a confession.

Which is why the courts often take a dim view of "irregulars" doing work for the police, often at their behest.

**So, is an alleged suicide attempt "virtually a confession"? Again, remember no one official witnessed this, just the "irregulars." And if Amberley is mentally ill, then any attempt at self-harm could have multiple meanings besides an admission of guilt.

Fortunately, the bodies were found, and the ersatz gas chamber, so it's rather a moot point. Still, "bluffing" rascals into attempting suicide doesn't have a ton of evidentiary value, if you ask me.

**Inspector MacKinnon: "You will excuse us for feeling sore when you jump in with methods which we cannot use, and so rob us of the credit."

But you sent him to Holmes!!

In fairness, it quite likely wasn't MacKinnon himself who sent Amberley to Holmes. Still, you're surely not allowed to complain when you pass of loser cases to civilians and they go and solve them for you. You clearly made yourself look bad in that case.

**Rather a broad defamation: "Amberley excelled at chess -- one mark, Watson, of a scheming mind."

Really?

Of course, Ernest played chess, too--was he a schemer? Should police haunt chess clubs, looking for potential master criminals and murderers?

**Paint, obviously, was way stinkier back in the day.

**Josiah's alibi was pretty terrible, as it was so easily checked: "I had examined the box-office chart at the Haymarket Theatre -- another of Dr. Watson's bull's-eyes -- and ascertained that neither B thirty nor thirty-two of the upper circle had been occupied that night."

**Holmes again boasting of his criminal prowess: "Burglary has always been an alternative profession had I cared to adopt it, and I have little doubt that I should have come to the front."

**The death chamber:

You see the gas-pipe along the skirting here. Very good. It rises in the angle of the wall, and there is a tap here in the corner. The pipe runs out into the strong-room, as you can see, and ends in that plaster rose in the centre of the ceiling, where it is concealed by the ornamentation. That end is wide open.

Many have asked how long it took to fashion this gas chamber; how it was done without the wife or servant noticing; and what that tells us about how long Josiah had been planning this double homicide.

The BBC 1965 clarifies (or perhaps retcons) this, having Holmes explain that the gas line was pre-existing, running to lighting in the room. Amberley had removed the light fixture, and removed the shut off knob on the gas line. So no expensive and time-consuming alterations needed...

**The dying words:

'We we --' That's all. "What do you make of that?" "Well, it's only a foot above the ground. The poor devil was on the floor dying when he wrote it. He lost his senses before he could finish." "He was writing, 'We were murdered.' "

Talk about confirmation bias! Couldn't it just as well have been a confession--"We were having an affair"? "We were guilty, so we decided to kill ourselves"??

**Sherlock's diagnosis of Josiah:

But, first, I would give you an insight into this man's mentality. It is a very unusual one -- so much so that I think his destination is more likely to be Broadmoor than the scaffold. He has, to a high degree, the sort of mind which one associates with the mediaeval Italian nature rather than with the modern Briton... Like all misers, he was a jealous man, and his jealousy became a frantic mania.

Or, just a murdering bastard.

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE VEILED LODGER!!

The Adventure Of The Lion's Mane--The Jellyfish Did It?

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 27 Dec 2015 13:00:00 +0000

If you recall from my last post (too long ago--sorry!), I was not a big fan of the Sherlock Holmes-penned tale, The Adventure Of The Blanched Soldier. While I applauded Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's attempt to do something new, I thought the approach a failure. The tale was poorly told, essentially a series of LONG expositional narrations. Holmes was nowhere near a good a writer as Watson, and we sorely missed the doctor's descriptive detail. Holmes kept too much from the reader, so his solution seemed to be plucked out of thin air.

Well, The Adventure Of The Lion's Mane corrected much of that, and even though it, too, was "written" by Holmes, it is superior to Blanched Soldier in almost every way. Holmes' writing style is much more relaxed, and far more engaging. The characters are much more interesting. Holmes shares his thinking with the readers along the way, so we are viewing the mystery with him, and not watching a magician pull a rabbit out of a hat. There are a plethora of clues and suspects, making Lion's Mane really a pretty good read.

And then we find out the jellyfish did it.

It is interesting that, for both of the stories Doyle chose to feature Sherlock as narrator, no crime had been committed, and there was no villain. That, I might suspect, is part of the reason Lion's Mane gets lumped in with Blanched Soldier and dismissed as a failed experiment.

It's not as if every Sherlock Holmes mystery requires a crime...many haven't. And you don't always need an actual villain--but someone needs to have some agency in the tale, there must be some human reason for the events we have followed.

In Twisted Lip, for example, there was no crime committed (putting aside any vagrancy or begging laws). And there was no villain--Neville St. Claire was just engaged in a fairly embarrassing occupation, and wished to hide it from his family. But there was still human activity to uncover, an examination of motives and behaviors, and someone trying to frustrate Holmes' investigations

But in Blanched Soldier, the "mystery" was that Godfrey Emsworth had contracted a socially ostracizing disease. Shocking, perhaps. But Godfrey had not done anything to deserve getting sick, and was not behind any kind of master plot aside from staying hidden. There was no human agency to uncover, except for a slight social lie. Heavens, who among us hasn't said "Tell them I'm not home!"? That's hardly a mystery requiring Sherlock Holmes!

Of course, such a story can work--Blanched Soldier is very similar to Yellow Face, if you think about it--but Soldier was not well-written enough to grip us with a situation, so the lack of crime and villain is more noticeable and frustrating.

Despite many suspects and motives, Lion's Mane pulls the rug out from the reader, too, by revealing the killer was an animal--just a dumb act of nature, as it were. And by way of comparison, we should note that the other times the Canon provided us with animal killers, they were either trained beasts used by vile villains, or they were lashing out at villains trying to harm them. In Lion's Mane, the jellyfish may have well as been a bolt of lightning, or a falling boulder. It wasn't part of any criminal or shameful actions--it was just a random, fatal accident. Holmes may as well have been an insurance claims adjuster.

That ending--it was just an accident--only serves to highlight some of the story's strained coincidences, which a better ending might have kept hidden from us. If it wasn't the day after a big storm; if some students hadn't just happened to be kept from swimming that morning; if Fitzroy didn't happen to have a weak heart...remove any link in the unlikely chain, and either McPherson doesn't die, or someone else gets stung but survives, or there are witnesses to tell us what happened. So, without such strained manipulation of events by Doyle, no mystery.

Sure, arcane coincidences are often involved in explaining how accidents happened--but this is mystery fiction, and we expect a stronger resolution to a mystery than a shrug and, "well, nature is dangerous, I guess." It suddenly removers us from a moral universe, why people are responsible for theirs (an others') fates, and justice can come into play--even if Holmes did sometimes play a bit fast and loose with the concept. In detective fiction there usually is, whether we agree with it or not, a moral, a viewpoint. Lion's Mane robs us of that, a little bit, with a moral of "well, sometimes shit just happens, even if innocent people are almost arrested for it. Societal rules mean nothing if a giant jellyfish gets blown into your cove."

Which may not be a problem for you. But I suspect it is, because, as I said earlier, this is a pretty good story. But a lot of people dismiss it. In part it's because it appears in the little-respect Case-Book. In part, it's because it's a Holmes-narrated story, and we've been told they're no good.

But also, I think it's because it's the second tale in a row where the was no human mystery, and no villain to punish. Few have objected to "the snake did it" or "the horse did it," as resolutions to other mysteries. But with "Cyanea capillata did it," it's a revelation that bothers us, because it ultimately says, "Sometimes people just die in stupid ways, and there's nothing you can do about it, and no one to catch punish." How McPherson died was a mystery, but it wasn't a mystery story, despite all the trappings.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**I do think this story was much better written than its predecessor, Blanched Soldier.

I like to think that Doyle soon saw that Soldier was too cramped, too non-engaging to work, so he loosened up "Holmes'" writing-style considerably.

Of course, there are perfectly good in-story reasons to explain this. In Soldier, we're not sure exactly when in his life Holmes has put pen to paper. In Lion's Mane, though, we're quite clear that he's been in retirement for some time. Perhaps this has freed his mind a bit, literarily. It's also possible that Watson, having read Soldier, passed on some tips to Holmes on how to make a story more interesting for the reader.

But whatever meta explanation you'd like to give, Mane is not only a clearly better read than Soldier, but there are definitely bits which do show us things from Holmes' perspective rather than Watson's, and that makes for some very interesting tidbits which I'll try to mention as we skip through the story.

**So the two mysteries that Holmes narrates, with no Watson present, just happen to be medical mysteries? What the heck, Sir Arthur?

While the good doctor may not have been an expert on tropical diseases, it's certainly possible that he had encountered leprosy-sufferers during his travels, and perhaps he might have had some valuable input into this case (although Holmes had it solved 12 seconds in...)

And in this case, Watson might not have had any knowledge of jellyfish attacks. But since a part of this mystery was "how did Fitzroy die," Watson's opinion could hardly have been less valuable than the anonymous idiot doctor who testified at the inquest.

**This is also the second of two stories were people were killed by poisonous animals and left confusing dying words...

They were slurred and indistinct, but to my ear the last of them, which burst in a shriek from his lips, were "the Lion's Mane." It was utterly irrelevant and unintelligible, and yet I could twist the sound into no other sense.

I guess I shouldn't criticize people who are dying in intense agony, especially McPherson, who clearly had no idea what it was that killed him.

Still, if a victim could merely have blurted out "It was a snake!!' instead of "Oh my God! Helen! It was the band! The speckled band!", that might have made solving the murder a tiny bit easier. Ditto with Fitzroy's "the Lion's Mane"...maybe something like "In the lagoon!"?

All I'm saying is, practice your dying words, people. You can save detectives a whole lot of time rounding up your killers if you choose more carefully!

**Holmes: "I had given myself up entirely to that soothing life of Nature for which I had so often yearned during the long years spent amid the gloom of London."

A lot of people see that as, if not a contradiction of something Holmes said earlier, than at least a seemingly out of character attitude.

But we should remember--this is Sherlock himself writing. So any inconsistency comes from Watson's portrayal. It's possible that Holmes never expressed this desire to John, or that John never reported it to us.

And perhaps the years spent without Watson's partnership had taken a toll on the detective, and changed his attitude about London.

Regardless, this is certainly no reason to go about claiming the story "must" be non-canonical just because we learned something new about our hero from his own mouth.

**Holmes: "My house is lonely. I, my old housekeeper, and my bees have the estate all to ourselves."

It should be noted that, pre- or post-retirement, Holmes never took another flatmate besides Watson...

**Again, a new perspective on Holmes from the detective himself:

It was impossible to work upon so delightful a day, and I strolled out before breakfast to enjoy the exquisite air...Summer and winter he went for his swim, and, as I am a swimmer myself, I have often joined [McPherson].

Sherlock is more social and more outdoorsy than Watson portrayed him, it seems.

**A point where Watson's presence might have helped:

He was obviously dying. Those glazed sunken eyes and dreadful livid cheeks could mean nothing else...His back was covered with dark red lines as though he had been terribly flogged by a thin wire scourge. The instrument with which this punishment had been inflicted was clearly flexible, for the long, angry weals curved round his shoulders and ribs. There was blood dripping down his chin, for he had bitten through his lower lip in the paroxysm of his agony. His drawn and distorted face told how terrible that agony had been.

Now, I'm no doctor, obviously, but I have had a jellyfish sting plenty of times as a youth. Nothing as big as this Cyanea capillata. But still, ouch enough. Yet even given "dark lines as though he had been flogged," the flesh likely wouldn't have been actually torn, as almost any type of actual flogging would accomplished.

Perhaps having had a medical companion on hand, someone who might have recognized the symptoms of a poisoning by venom, might have made short work of this mystery. At the very least, he could have put paid to the notion of some type of "scourging" that didn't even rip the flesh.

**Our first suspect:

Murdoch was the mathematical coach at the establishment, a tall, dark, thin man, so taciturn and aloof that none can be said to have been his friend. He seemed to live in some high abstract region of surds and conic sections, with little to connect him with ordinary life.

Interesting, isn't it, that Sherlock describes the dour teacher in terms that Watson often used to describe him?

Given that Murdoch was a math teacher and a murder suspect, I'm surprised that no one has floated a theory that he was really Moriarty in disguise, and had trained a jellyfish to commit a diabolical murder...

**Dog abuse:

On one occasion, being plagued by a little dog belonging to McPherson, he had caught the creature up and hurled it through the plate-glass window, an action for which Stackhurst would certainly have given him his dismissal had he not been a very valuable teacher.

You know, he could have been the most valuable teacher in the world, and 99.99% of all institutions still would have sacked Murdoch instantly for that.

Even if the dog were "plaguing" him, that hardly justifies tossing the pooch through a window. And it's pretty hard for me to see most pet owners getting over that enough to actually become friends with the canine tosser:

But for a year or more Murdoch has been as near to McPherson as he ever could be to anyone. He is not of a very sympathetic disposition by nature."

"So I understand. I seem to remember your telling me once about a quarrel over the ill-usage of a dog."

"That blew over all right."

"But left some vindictive feeling, perhaps."

"No, no, I am sure they were real friends."

"Real friends" after trying to kill my dog? Inconceivable!

**Wait just one minute! McPherson wades into the pool, and is stung all over by the hidden jellyfish. He is dying, in unendurable agony.

But he takes the time to put his on his coat, trousers and shoes before climbing the path?!?!

That may be taking the modesty of the era too far. If he hadn't taken to time to half-dress, he might have reached Holmes with time enough to actually explain, instead of blurting out a cryptic phrase...

**One of the bigger hiccups in the mystery is: why did Holmes assume Fitzroy hadn't bathed? Simply because he was (partly) dressed and his towel was dry? "Had the body been found in the water I could hardly have missed it. It was the towel which misled me."

As many have observed, given that he had never used his towel, McPherson would almost certainly have been at least still damp, and it's difficult to conceive of the great detective missing this, dry towel or no.

Still, we're told that Fitzroy "had not been on the beach more than a quarter of an hour at the most." Allowing a little flexibility in that time, it's possible that he had mostly dried in the sun and morning air as he struggled up the cliff. And giving the hideousness of his death, and trace remaining water could have been dismissed as sweat produced in the "infernal agony."

**But even if you assume McPherson hadn't swam, Holmes still should have searched the "lagoon," right? If you're committed to the theory that some "flexible scourge" had been used to flail Fitzroy, isn't it possible that the killer might have hidden it in the water? Just because you think that Fitzroy hadn't gone in the water, doesn't mean the alleged killer hadn't.

**Holmes has become much better at describing characters: "Anderson, the village constable, a big, ginger-moustached man of the slow, solid Sussex breed -- a breed which covers much good sense under a heavy, silent exterior."

**When your teacher is a dick: "Ian Murdoch held them back," said he. "He would insist upon some algebraic demonstration before breakfast."

Algebra before breakfast? Human rights violation!!

**Perhaps Sherlock wasn't as familiar with the community as he thought, as he is completely unaware of the existence of Maud Bellamy, despite her apparent local fame: "Everyone knows her. She is the beauty of the neighbourhood --a real beauty, Holmes, who would draw attention everywhere."

Yet it seems that she was more observant, and recognized Holmes even though he had never seen her before: "It seems that she already knew me by sight, for she turned to me at the end..."

**Tempers are really on edge at The Gables:

"What were you doing there?" he asked.

Murdoch's face flushed with anger. "I am your subordinate, sir, under your roof. I am not aware that I owe you any account of my private actions."

Stackhurst's nerves were near the surface after all he had endured. Otherwise, perhaps, he would have waited. Now he lost his temper completely. "In the circumstances your answer is pure impertinence, Mr. Murdoch."

"Your own question might perhaps come under the same heading."

"This is not the first time that I have had to overlook your insubordinate ways. It will certainly be the last. You will kindly make fresh arrangements for your future as speedily as you can."

Well, that got out of hand quickly, didn't it?

Still, a colleague has just been (apparently) murdered, so perhaps it's not surprising that raw emotions quickly broke through into what should have been a civilized conversation...

**So much for Holmes' not forming theories before all the facts are in:

The one thing that impressed itself forcibly upon my mind was that Mr. Ian Murdoch was taking the first chance to open a path of escape from the scene of the crime. Suspicion, vague and nebulous, was now beginning to take outline in my mind. AND Again the shadow round this strange man seemed to me to be taking more definite shape. His record must be examined. His rooms must be privately searched.

Still, such theorizing is preferable to Holmes keeping the reader in the dark until the bitter end.

Still, searching a man's rooms on "vague and nebulous" suspicions? I guess that, as the rooms belonged to The Gables institution, and it wasn't the police doing the searching, no violation of Murdoch's rights occurred...

**More Victorian/Edwardian morality on the role of young women in society from Tom Bellamy:

My son here...is of one mind with me that Mr. McPherson's attentions to Maud were insulting. Yes, sir, the word 'marriage' was never mentioned, and yet there were letters and meetings, and a great deal more of which neither of us could approve.

Heavens--letters AND meetings?!?! How scandalous! Women must be protected from any attention from men unless marriage is discussed? I would have loved to see him try to raise a daughter in the era of email and Twitter and being with boys in school and...

And later, Bellamy declares, "I object to my girl picking up with men outside her own station." So sexist and classist. King jerk, is all I'm saying.

**And it wasn't just Tom Bellamy who was a bit retrograde in his feelings towards unapproved couplings, as Maud tells us. "We were engaged to be married, and we only kept it secret because Fitzroy's uncle, who is very old and said to be dying, might have disinherited him if he had married against his wish."

This isn't the first time we have seen people hide relationships to avoid rich relatives finding out and disinheriting them. For me, it would have to be one hell of a potential bequest to get me to hide my love life like then. Then again, you do see people hide their relationships for all sorts of reasons, even today, including a fear of upsetting relatives.

One interesting question: why would the uncle have objected to this match? Bellamy clearly feels that Maud was above Fitzroy's station--so wouldn't he have been marrying up? Why would the uncle have resisted that?

Then again, we're told that Bellamy "was a fisherman to start with." Perhaps Uncle Bob objected because he felt that money didn't grant social status, and nouveau riche or not, he didn't want his heir to marry the child of a mere fisherman.

Damn, class and social strata are funny things...

**Holmes describing Maud:

Who could have imagined that so rare a flower would grow from such a root and in such an atmosphere? Women have seldom been an attraction to me, for my brain has always governed my heart, but I could not look upon her perfect clear-cut face, with all the soft freshness of the downlands in her delicate colouring, without realizing that no young man would cross her path unscathed....Maud Bellamy will always remain in my memory as a most complete and remarkable woman.

Again, many have thought this completely uncharacteristic of Sherlock. But this is the first time that we have Holmes himself describing a beautiful woman to us.

This is another case of Watson not filtering things through his perspective for us. Good on Doyle for not making everything a carbon copy of how Watson would have described Holmes' reaction.

**Holmes: I turned over the paper. "This never came by post. How did you get it?"

How did he know that? It's never explained, and I not sure how he knows. Had the paper never been folded, and was too big to have fit into any envelope? But the note was "crumpled" when she pulled it out...?

**Holmes:

You have known what it was to be in a nightmare in which you feel that there is some all-important thing for which you search and which you know is there, though it remains forever just beyond your reach.

As someone who is finding my memory deteriorating (seemingly by the day), I sympathize with this, and admire Holmes' self-honesty.

**How badly is Holmes losing his sharpness?

You will know, or Watson has written in vain, that I hold a vast store of out-of-the-way knowledge without scientific system, but very available for the needs of my work. My mind is like a crowded box-room with packets of all sorts stowed away therein -- so many that I may well have but a vague perception of what was there. I had known that there was something which might bear upon this matter. It was still vague, but at least I knew how I could make it clear.

This does seem to contradict Holmes' earlier descriptions of how he preserved his mental sharpness.

But then again, that was Holmes when he first met Watson, and now Holmes is much older, in retirement, and the discipline he alluded to in Study In Scarlet may be fading, either through relaxation--or deteriorating faculties.

And once again, this is Holmes himself telling us, and not something being filtered through his Boswell. Perhaps Watson misunderstood/misreported earlier...

**The joys of policing a small town, as put forth by Inspector Bardle: "Yes, sir. There is really no one else when you come to think of it. That's the advantage of this solitude. We narrow it down to a very small compass. If he did not do it, then who did?"

Compare, of course, to Holmes' famous admonition about remote country living in Copper Beeches:

"Do you know, Watson," said he, "that it is one of the curses of a mind with a turn like mine that I must look at everything with reference to my own special subject. You look at these scattered houses, and you are impressed by their beauty. I look at them, and the only thought which comes to me is a feeling of their isolation and of the impunity with which crime may be committed there."

"Good heavens!" I cried. "Who would associate crime with these dear old homesteads?"

"They always fill me with a certain horror. It is my belief, Watson, founded upon my experience, that the lowest and vilest alleys in London do not present a more dreadful record of sin than does the smiling and beautiful countryside."

"You horrify me!"

"But the reason is very obvious. The pressure of public opinion can do in the town what the law cannot accomplish. There is no lane so vile that the scream of a tortured child, or the thud of a drunkard's blow, does not beget sympathy and indignation among the neighbours, and then the whole machinery of justice is ever so close that a word of complaint can set it going, and there is but a step between the crime and the dock. But look at these lonely houses, each in its own fields, filled for the most part with poor ignorant folk who know little of the law. Think of the deeds of hellish cruelty, the hidden wickedness which may go on, year in, year out, in such places, and none the wiser. Had this lady who appeals to us for help gone to live in Winchester, I should never have had a fear for her. It is the five miles of country which makes the danger.

Not to mention, of course, the the inspector completely overlooks the possibility of someone from outside the community coming to commit a crime...

**Unacceptable inquest:

"Have you examined the marks?" I asked. "I have seen them. So has the doctor." "But I have examined them very carefully with a lens. They have peculiarities."

Good gosh, I don't expect a 1907 Surrey doctor to necessarily have the capability to run a "tox screen" and discover jellyfish venom.

But to not have "examined the marks very carefully with a lens"??? What did this quack do, just shrug his shoulders and say, "Well, he's dead, I guess!"????

**Alcohol was apparently the most potent cure against jellyfish toxin:

"Brandy! Brandy!" he gasped, and fell groaning upon the sofa..."Yes, yes, brandy!" he cried. "The man is at his last gasp. It was all I could do to bring him here. He fainted twice upon the way." Half a tumbler of the raw spirit brought about a wondrous change...More and more brandy was poured down his throat, each fresh dose bringing him back to life.

Also, the account from Holmes' book said a victim "gulped down brandy, a whole bottleful, and it seems to have saved his life."

Of course, it was common in the day to see liquor as a restorative, and especially brandy. And it's not the first time we've seen it used in these stories.

**The reveal:

"Cyanea!" I cried. "Cyanea! Behold the Lion's Mane!"

The strange object at which I pointed did indeed look like a tangled mass torn from the mane of a lion. It lay upon a rocky shelf some three feet under the water, a curious waving, vibrating, hairy creature with streaks of silver among its yellow tresses. It pulsated with a slow, heavy dilation and contraction.

The jellyfish did it...

**That was actually a real book, a real author, and an actual passage that Holmes read to us:

It is Out of Doors, by the famous observer, J. G. Wood. Wood himself very nearly perished from contact with this vile creature, so he wrote with a very full knowledge. Cyanea capillata is the miscreant's full name, and he can be as dangerous to life as, and far more painful than, the bite of the cobra.

Wood also wrote about jellyfish attacks in other books, so they obvioously made a huge impression on him.

**Holmes: "I am an omnivorous reader with a strangely retentive memory for trifles."

A retentive memory that failed to remember for over a week...

**Holmes: "That phrase 'the Lion's Mane' haunted my mind. I knew that I had seen it somewhere in an unexpected context."

So, then, it's remarkably convenient for solving this mystery that those were Fitzroy's last words...

**Stackhurst and Murdoch make up:

Stackhurst held out his hand. "Our nerves have all been at concert-pitch," said he. "Forgive what is past, Murdoch. We shall understand each other better in the future."

Awww...

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE RETIRED COLOURMAN!!

The Adventure Of The Blanched Soldier--Detective, Heal Thyself!!

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 06 Dec 2015 13:00:00 +0000

All of us have thought, "I can do X better than he" at some point in our life.

It's part of human nature, to apprise our own skills more highly than those of another, even if we don't actually have any evidence or experience to back that up.

But when it come time to put brush to canvas, as it were, well, it can be a rude awakening.

Which brings us to The Adventure Of The Blanched Soldier.

Many, many times, Sherlock Holmes has criticized John Watson's written accounts of their cases. Well, the shoe is on the other foot, now, and the results are not exactly to Holmes' credit.

Let's step back to the real world, for a second, away from the "gentle fiction." Of course Holmes and Watson aren't real. So the decision to have Sherlock take up the pen himself comes squarely down to the creator and author, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Nearing the end of his 40-year run on the character, Sir Arthur should be commended for trying to keep things fresh and interesting, to shake up the formula. It would have been remarkably easy to coast at this late point in his life, as he approached his 70th birthday. You merely have to travel to a modern bookstore to see how many series of crime fiction continue on and on, with no real changes to the basic premise, and a cookie cutter approach to each new novel. Or, a "co-writer" is hired to do most of the actual work while the creator keeps his name in large print and continues to rake in the bucks.

So props to Doyle. Why not, in your 52nd Holmes short story, try something new, by having Holmes himself narrate? Why not shake up the formula a little bit?

That leaves us two questions, I think, outside of the quality of the mystery itself (which I will try to tackle below). First, does Sir Arthur do a good job of altering his usual writing style, to make it convincing that a different "author" "writing" this story? Secondly, does leaving Watson aside turn out to be a good choice for storytelling purpose?

As to the first question, I think the answer is a resounding "yes." The prose and narrative style Doyle employs here is quite different than that he used when Watson was the putative author. Take, for example, the very first line of the story: "The ideas of my friend Watson, though limited, are exceedingly pertinacious."

Well, that's just not a sentence you would hear Watson writing, is it? Aside from the vocabulary, that's just not the way John Watson would start a story, is it? Watson might express a similar thought, but only as a way of trying to justify his decision why to write up the current mystery, or to give us a greater picture of the subject of his admiration, Sherlock Holmes. And think about this:

Perhaps I have rather invited this persecution, since I have often had occasion to point out to him how superficial are his own accounts and to accuse him of pandering to popular taste instead of confining himself rigidly to facts and figures. "Try it yourself, Holmes!" he has retorted, and I am compelled to admit that, having taken my pen in my hand, I do begin to realize that the matter must be presented in such a way as may interest the reader.

While Watson passed along Holmes' opinion often enough, it was almost never to defend himself, but to illuminate Sherlock. And it rarely came in the story's preamble. But here Holmes, rather than introducing the actual tale, instead of leading us into the mystery, is writing about writing! And making himself the subject, something Watson was loathe to do when he had the writing reins.

Another way that Doyle makes Holmes' writing differ from Watson's is by having having Sherlock's be much less descriptive, especially of people. When Dodd arrives at Baker Street, for example, Holmes describes him thusly: "I had my visit from Mr. James M. Dodd, a big, fresh, sunburned, upstanding Briton." That's it! Watson would have taken at least two more sentences to fully describe Dodd's physical appearance.

Another example: When Holmes finally meets the colonel, all he gives us is "bristling beard and twisted features, as terrible an old man as ever I have seen." Contrast with the way Dodd had described Emsworth much more interestingly, as "a huge, bow-backed man with a smoky skin and a straggling gray beard, seated behind his littered desk. A red-veined nose jutted out like a vulture's beak, and two fierce gray eyes glared at me from under tufted brows." The latter is obviously a much more Watsonian description, but Holmes seems to pass along such information only when transcribing the words of other people.

So, if you were to ask my humble opinion, Sir Arthur does a fine job of differentiating between Watson as biographer and Holmes as autobiographer. But does that work for a Holmes story?

There are two major ways that it fails. First, the drier, less descriptive prose of Sherlock Holmes is far less interesting to read than Watson's. Holmes may have felt that all of the extraneous detail (and humanity) that Watson included in each tale was distracting. But as I have noted here before, Watson gave us a sense of time, a sense of place, a window in to the culture of the era. Holmes is utterly uninterested in such details, unless they're key to solving his mystery, and so he gives them little attention. It may be more direct, but it is far less involving, far less immersive then the stories as Watson told them.

The second, and perhaps more important, is that Watson, by his mere presence, was able to pace a story better, and keep thee tale as a whole flowing.

For example, Watson would often question Holmes about his theories of the case. And even when Holmes chose to be cryptic, still the interplay between the characters was worth reading...and even when being deliberately vague, Holmes would give us some clues to his insights.

In Blanched Patient, though, without Watson to banter with, Holmes takes being opaque to heights that hurt the readers' interest. Once he's solved the case, before even getting up from his chair, this is all he gives the reader:

Such was the problem which my visitor laid before me. It presented, as the astute reader will have already perceived, few difficulties in its solution, for a very limited choice of alternatives must get to the root of the matter. Still, elementary as it was, there were points of interest and novelty about it which may excuse my placing it upon record.

Dry, dull. Not a hint of what he's thinking. It's tough for the audience to "play along" with the author when the author shows no interest in playing whatsoever. Holmes says, "The narratives of Watson have accustomed the reader, no doubt, to the fact that I do not waste words or disclose my thoughts while a case is actually under consideration." But that's not true at all!

If Watson had been along, the doctor would have offered some theories, which Holmes would shoot down with explanations that enlightened the reader; or Watson would have expressed befuddlement, and Holmes would have remonstrated him while offering "teasers" about what he thought were the important clues. When Watson was present, Sherlock was interested in trying to teach him, to bring him along with his thought processes, which helps the reader.. Without Watson, Holmes shows not the least interest in helping the reader along.

And frankly, as a writer Watson was better at pacing a story, at breaking up the large expanses of exposition that began many a Holmes story. When Dodd tells his tale, it goes on forever--11 pages of nearly uninterrupted, monologued exposition. And, to quote Holmes from elsewhere in the story, "here it is that I miss my Watson. By cunning questions and ejaculations of wonder he could elevate my simple art, which is but systematized common sense, into a prodigy." We don't get the questions or ejaculations, or Watson's narrative on how he feels about the tale that is being spun in front of him. There is no nudging, no pressing for additional details (except "what newspaper was it?"), no description of Holmes' demeanor during the interview. This is where Watson's presence is missed the most, because he would have broken up this massive block of dictation for us, and presented this as a story, and not as unbroken testimony. (This happens, albeit to a lesser extent, at the end, when young Emsworth tells his story in yet another long unbroken monologue.)

So, for this story at least, the use of Holmes as "author" is a bit of a failure. While Doyle does a fine job of presenting the story as if Sherlock had written it, that style is so bereft of pacing, of dramatic flow, of interaction between characters, it reads more like an overlong treatise than a mystery story. We can applaud the attempt, while thinking the results were perhaps much more lackluster than Sir Arthur would have liked.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**So the first story without Watson, and you decide to do a "medical" mystery?!? *Face palm*

Not that there's anything inherently wrong with the medical mystery. Heck, the hero of the television series House, M.D. was based on Sherlock Holmes.

But--and this is entirely my personal predilections--I don't really care for "medical" shows. You know how some people have a problem with Star Trek "technobabble"? Well, that's pretty much how a medical-jargon based mystery feels to me--all the terminology might as well be Greek (or Klingon), and makes my eyes glaze over.

Again, that's just my personal tastes. But it proves a double disadvantage in this case. In an episode of House, you have the head doctor constantly debating the meanings of symptoms and what could be causing them with his colleagues. So at the very least, the medically unenlightened (me!) can follow along. But in Blanched Soldier, there is none of that back and forth, none of that discussing and dismissing of theories. Holmes keeps all the cards to himself...he won't even tell us that the gent he brings along is a doctor, so we don't even know that it's a medical mystery to begin with!!

So when Holmes pulls out the solution at the end--it's leprosy!!--it feels like a cheat, a magic trick akin to his unveiling of cabby as the killer in Study In Scarlet, something that comes completely out of left field, without any basis in what we've read so far. It feels more like a feat of prestidigitation than a series of deductions, because Holmes (and Doyle) choose to keep everything from the reader until the end.

I'll accept an argument that contemporary readers might have been more aware of leprosy, and thus would have been better able to follow along with Holmes. But for modern readers? Literally the only clues we're given is that Emsworth served in South Africa, and his brow was terribly pale. I don't expect every mystery to be a "play fair," but that's asking too much of us.

So, not such a good mystery, I think...

**"Oh, it's not leprosy, is "pseudo-leprosy," which is not contagious and it's curable" sure as hell sounds like a risible, made-up happy ending, doesn't it?

It is often my lot to bring ill-tidings and seldom good," said he. "This occasion is the more welcome. It is not leprosy." "What?" "A well-marked case of pseudo-leprosy or ichthyosis, a scale-like affection of the skin, unsightly, obstinate, but possibly curable, and certainly noninfective.

But ichthyosis was commonly referred to as pseudo-leprosy in the medical literature of the era, so it's not completely out of left field to use that description. Although, as Sir James Saunders noted, it was quite a coincidence that a man suspected of contracting leprosy would actually contract ichthyosis, which isn't really related. And the explanation that maybe Emsworth psychosomatically gave himself the wrong disease?

But is it coincidence? Are there not subtle forces at work of which we know little? Are we assured that the apprehension from which this young man has no doubt suffered terribly since his exposure to its contagion may not produce a physical effect which simulates that which it fears?

The less we think about that, the better off we are, I think...

**Holmes: "The good Watson had at that time deserted me for a wife, the only selfish action which I can recall in our association. I was alone."

I try not to spend too much time worrying about chronology, or Watson's marriage(s).

But almost every Sherlockian agrees that Watson's marriage to Mary Morstan happened more than a decade before this story was set. So if Watson has married again--or for that matter, if he is still married to Mary, and she has just returned from somewhere--this clearly cannot be the first time that Watson has "deserted" Holmes, selfish or not.

Or was Watson fudging dates even more significantly than we had thought?

**Holmes has quite a compliment for Watson...

Speaking of my old friend and biographer, I would take this opportunity to remark that if I burden myself with a companion in my various little inquiries it is not done out of sentiment or caprice, but it is that Watson has some remarkable characteristics of his own to which in his modesty he has given small attention amid his exaggerated estimates of my own performances.

but then he has to go and turn it into a left-handed compliment, or even an insult:

...A confederate who foresees your conclusions and course of action is always dangerous, but one to whom each development comes as a perpetual surprise, and to whom the future is always a closed book, is indeed an ideal helpmate.

Oh, Sherlock...

**One advantage of having Sherlock as our narrator is that we can get actual confirmation of some of his motives for how he conducts his interviews.

For example, "It is my habit to sit with my back to the window and to place my visitors in the opposite chair, where the light falls full upon them." and "I have found it wise to impress clients with a sense of power, and so I gave him some of my conclusions."

**Dodd's initial reason for concern:

He was my mate -- and that means a good deal in the Army....I got one letter from the hospital at Cape Town and one from Southampton. Since then not a word -- not one word, Mr. Holmes, for six months and more, and he my closest pal...He was a good lad, and he would not drop a pal like that.

Hmmm. I know Holmes is (theoretically) transcribing what Dodd says. But given Sherlock's earlier lamentations about Watson's "deserting" him, do I detect a bit of a jibe at Watson, who did "drop a pal?"

**Dodd: "Tuxbury Old Hall is inaccessible -- five miles from anywhere. There was no trap at the station, so I had to walk, carrying my suitcase, and it was nearly dark before I arrived."

I know that, to the older Emsworth, Dodd was an unwelcome visitor. But making a guest walk five miles, while carrying his own luggage?!? How very unspeakably ill-mannered! Surely that would have lead to unwelcome gossip and hurt the family's reputation!

Of course, the colonel had no problem providing a trap when he kick Dodd out...

**Dodd again: "There was a butler, old Ralph, who seemed about the same age as the house, and there was his wife, who might have been older. She had been Godfrey's nurse, and I had heard him speak of her as second only to his mother in his affections, so I was drawn to her in spite of her queer appearance. The mother I liked also -- a gentle little white mouse of a woman. It was only the colonel himself whom I barred."

Perhaps it's just speculation, but Dodd seems only to like those he perceives as non-threatening...or easily cowed? Problems with authority?

**Dodd describes Emsworth's suspicious demeanor:

'Well, sir,' said he in a rasping voice, 'I should be interested to know the real reasons for this visit.'

"I answered that I had explained them in my letter to his wife. "

'Yes, yes, you said that you had known Godfrey in Africa. We have, of course, only your word for that.'

Again, this may seem unbelievably rude for the era.

Although, given some of the crazy schemes we've seen con men and thieves uses to get access to houses that we've seen in the Canon, can we really say that the old man is wrong to be so untrusting?

**Upper class insults: 'Many people, Mr. Dodd,' said he, 'would take offence at your infernal pertinacity and would think that this insistence had reached the point of damned impertinence.'

Oh, snap!!

**Top melodrama:

" 'Listen,' I said. 'You are going to answer one question before you leave if I have to hold you all night. Is Godfrey dead?"
"He could not face my eyes. He was like a man hypnotized The answer was dragged from his lips. It was a terrible and unexpected one. " 'I wish to God he was!' he cried, and, tearing himself free he dashed from the room.

** Fair enough theory, given the lack of medical knowledge, and Holmes refusing to share anything whatsoever:

"Clearly my poor friend had become involved in some criminal or, at the least, disreputable transaction which touched the family honour. That stern old man had sent his son away and hidden him from the world lest some scandal should come to light."

Holmes dismisses that:

No unsolved crime had been reported from that district. I was sure of that. If it were some crime not yet discovered, then clearly it would be to the interest of the family to get rid of the delinquent and send him abroad rather than keep him concealed at home.

Well, perhaps. But what if it were a non-local crime that had been committed--something elsewhere in England, or during his travels home, or even in South Africa--that was the reason his family was trying to conceal him?

**The shame of leprosy:

There was something shocking about the man, Mr. Holmes. It wasn't merely that ghastly face glimmering as white as cheese in the darkness. It was more subtle than that -- something slinking, something furtive, something guilty -- something very unlike the frank, manly lad that I had known. It left a feeling of horror in my mind.

Just the thought that he had leprosy made Geoffrey "slinking, furtive and guilty."

**Holmes: "It happened that at the moment I was clearing up the case which my friend Watson has described as that of the Abbey School, in which the Duke of Greyminster was so deeply involved."

Wait, is Holmes referring to The Adventure Of The Priory School? But Watson was clearly a bachelor and living in Baker Street then: "We have had some dramatic entrances and exits upon our small stage at Baker Street, but I cannot recollect anything more sudden and startling than the first appearance of Thorneycroft Huxtable, M.A., Ph.D., etc."

Most chronologists place the Priory School in 1901, and Holmes definitively tells us that this case takes place in 1903. So is he referring to the same case? Are the Abbey School and the Duke of Greyminster really Priory School and the Duke of Holderness? Are there some issues from that case that still needed "clearing up" two years later? Or is this some other case entirely? And if so, how was Watson involved, if he had "abandoned" Holmes?

**Another apocryphal case: "I had also a commission from the Sultan of Turkey which called for immediate action, as political consequences of the gravest kind might arise from its neglect."

**And one more untold tale: "I was able once to do him a professional service, and he is ready to advise as a friend rather than as a specialist. His name is Sir James Saunders."

**A typical Holmes trick, this time with the master narrating his moves rather than Watson:

I have, as my friend Watson may have remarked, an abnormally acute set of senses, and a faint but incisive scent was apparent. It seemed to centre on the hall table. I turned, placed my hat there, knocked it off, stooped to pick it up, and contrived to bring my nose within a foot of the gloves.

**Despite Holmes' reputation, detectives were clearly held is disrepute.

Emsworth: "As to you, sir," turning upon me, "I extend the same warning to you. I am familiar with your ignoble profession, but you must take your reputed talents to some other field. There is no opening for them here."

Ignoble? Snap again!!

**Of course, if the colonel were so knowledgeable about what detectives do, he wouldn't have been so surprised by Holmes figuring out the truth..."How do you know?" he gasped, sitting down heavily in his chair. "It is my business to know things. That is my trade."

** "Well, it's not a long story to tell," says Geoffrey.

But it takes another 3 pages of uninterrupted exposition!! Man, this story is nothing but pacing problems!!

**Odd weather description, as apparently a cold day in South Africa is worse than a cold day in London (or Michigan): "You remember the kind of numb cold which used to come at evening, a deadly, sickening sort of cold, very different from a crisp healthy frost."

**Given what he thought he had contracted, you'd think that Geoffrey could have been a little bit more sympathetic in his description of others so afflicted:

In front of me was standing a small, dwarf-like man with a huge, bulbous head, who was jabbering excitedly in Dutch, waving two horrible hands which looked to me like brown sponges. Behind him stood a group of people who seemed to be intensely amused by the situation, but a chill came over me as I looked at them. Not one of them was a normal human being. Every one was twisted or swollen or disfigured in some strange way. The laughter of these strange monstrosities was a dreadful thing to hear.

**Sherlock's description seems a far cry from Dodd's panicked "ghostly" and "ghastly" and "as white as cheese":

His appearance was certainly extraordinary. One could see that he had indeed been a handsome man with clear-cut features sunburned by an African sun, but mottled in patches over this darker surface were curious whitish patches which had bleached his skin.

Not to make light of ichthyosis, but that really doesn't sound nearly as horrifying as Dodd described...

**Well, at least the family hired a doctor?

Under pledge of secrecy, Mr. Kent, who is a surgeon, was prepared to stay with me...

May I ask, sir, if you are an authority on such complaints, which are, I understand, tropical or semi-tropical in their nature?"

"I have the ordinary knowledge of the educated medical man," he observed with some stiffness.

Geez, at least get a specialist to look at him?? Especially since his diagnosis was, well, really wrong? Was the family shame so bad that they couldn't at least get a, well, good doctor?

**Geoffrey: "But absolute secrecy was necessary, or even in this quiet countryside there would have been an outcry, and I should have been dragged to my horrible doom."

Really? You're expecting a lynch mob? Well, maybe. I can't speak to the general British populace's (or authority's) fear of leprosy in 1903. But we've been told how isolated the estate was--5 miles from anything else! Was he any more of a treat to public health than typhoid or cholera patients?

**See, it wasn't just Watson making that up: "That process," said I, "starts upon the supposition that when you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."

** Good to know: "It is not illegal, however, to keep a lunatic upon private premises so long as there is a qualified person in attendance and that the authorities have been duly notified."

I wonder if that's still the case...

**Of course, when one is afraid of torch-wielding villagers or the like, you have to wonder how impressed they'll be by "it's only pseudo-leprosy!!" Which is probably the reason the term fell out of favor. Still, it's hard to see the Emsworth's fear of medical shaming allowing even the "safe" ichtyosis diagnosis to be made public...

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE LION'S MANE!!

The Adventure Of The Three Gables--Sherlock As Atticus Finch?!?

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 15 Nov 2015 13:00:00 +0000

We've all experienced this, haven't we? We go home for a family gathering, and a favorite uncle or cousin we've long admired is there. Our ideal is shattered, though, when the relative suddenly blurts out something hateful and racist, and suddenly you're disillusioned and uncomfortable and you have no idea what to do.

Which brings us to The Adventure of The Three Gables.

One of the reasons this post is so late is that I have no idea what to do here.

Like when your beloved grandfather starts dropping anti-Semitic comments during Thanksgiving dinner...what do you do? Try and correct him? Start a big argument that ruins dinner for everybody? Press too hard and you find out that many more of your loved ones harbor similar disturbing prejudices? Keep eating and stew in silence? Stop accepting invitations to family gatherings?

Granted, Sherlock Holmes (and Watson) are fictional characters, but in some ways the sting is just as bad. To see a character you admire, the epitome of intellect and reason and not letting unwarranted prejudices cloud your reason, speaking and behaving in way that you feel is racist--it jars. It hurts.

Now, as a middle-aged middle-class white male, I am spectacularly unequipped to speak intelligently on such issues. Anything I can add to the discussion would be as an outsider dilettante, right?

And there are some halfhearted defenses I could try to make of Holmes' behavior in this story. "All his jabs weren't directed at blacks in general, just at Steve Dixie. He wasn't generalizing, he wasn't being racist--Dixie really did smell bad!" Or "Holmes didn't really feel that way--he was trying to use those comments to get under Dixie's skin, to throw him off guard and get him to blurt out information about his boss!" Or "Holmes was just as rude to Sam Merton the boxer in Mazarin Stone! He's not racist, he just hates dumb bruisers in general!" Or "...but The Adventure Of The Yellow Face!!"

And they even be some glimmers of truth, and perhaps mitigation, in those arguments. But Watson himself is also not terribly pleasant in some of his descriptions of Mr. Dixie, and in his transcription of his dialogue. So we can't just dismiss complaints about this story out-of-hand with rhetorical tricks. As regular reader Arynne said, "[Holmes] is a racist asshole in Three Gables!" It's difficult for me to reject that conclusion.

Perhaps a better question is--should we be surprised? After all, even in real life, people are terribly complicated, and inconsistent in ways that would never pass muster if we analyzed them the way we analyzed literary works. Abraham Lincoln, the Great Emancipator, held views on race relations that, while common at the time, would have right-thinking people reject the entirety of his career if spoken today. People can be more than one thing at once, even contradictory things.

That can be true in literature and entertainment, too. Without getting into all of the controversy over the release of the "sequel" to To Kill A Mockingbird, Go Set A Watchman tells of an Atticus Finch in his older days who maybe isn't quite the perfect idol of liberalism 9th grade English classes (and Gregory Peck) have made him to be for decades. He attends meetings of racist organizations! He for "states' rights!" Despite his defense of Tom Robinson, he doesn't support integration or full civil rights for blacks!!

Good Lord, you would have thought they were murdering puppies on Main Street, so great was the anguished outcry by people astonished that their lifetime hero maybe, just maybe, was not an icon of perfection!! How dare you tell us our heroes are complex and contradictory and...

We can see a similar thing in the original Star Trek. It was the 1960s, and they liked to make a big deal over Earth overcoming all its prejudices and hatreds. But every single episode featured the chief medical officer making racist comments about the ship's first officer. So much for racism being over...or does racism not count if you're only racist against fictional races and species? (And yes, insert all of the defenses of "they're friends" and "he's just needling Spock" you like...but then ask yourself why some of those same defenses wouldn't apply to Holmes in this story.) This and later iterations of Trek were quick to assert that everybody on a planet had the exact same culture and behavior: Tellarites are all quarrelsome, Ferengi are all greedy, Klingons are all warlike, etc. Hell, the Next Generation episode Redemption Part II has a high-ranking Star Fleet officer say that, "No one would suggest that a Klingon would be a good ship's counselor, or that a Berellian could be an engineer. They're just not suited for those positions." Even the mighty Federation, it seems, can harbor some racism (or specieism) in the future.

I can't get into the mind of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, but surely he was, just as we all are, products of our time. That's not a defense, of course. And I'm not going to get so clever as to say "he was only portraying the racism of the times, he wasn't actually racist himself." Maybe he was, maybe he wasn't. We can't know, though, so where does that leave us?

As I said above, I just don't know. The best I can do here is to suggest that Sherlock Holmes is as human as the rest of us. That he is vast, and contains multitudes, and some of the lesser multitudes peeked out during this story...and maybe allowing for a little bit of mitigation for the era, a little bit for the possibility that Holmes may have been trying to provoke a perp...

Yeah, Sherlock is a "racist bastard" in Three Gables. I don't think that we toss out the whole story because our hero was less than perfect this time around. We continue to admire Lincoln and Atticus Finch. We still watch Star Wars despite "I'd just as soon kiss a Wookie." And we still go to family gatherings despite Uncle Bob's occasional embarrassing moment.

That's the best I've got.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**All of the above being said, this is a pretty nice little story, marred only by two things: we should have met Langdale Pike, and the ending was far too abrupt. How did Holmes explain the largesse of a world trip to Mrs. Maberley?

Otherwise, it is a fairly low stakes affair, with the whole motive revolving around that old Victorian fear of scandal. Good heavens!!

**The Granada adaptation manages to greatly raise the stakes. In the television version, Douglas Maberley actually because of the beating Isadora Klein's goons gave him. Apparently, the attack "ruptured his spleen," according to Watson, which somehow caused the pneumonia that killed him!! That was the reason she was so desperate to get the "novel"--it functioned as an accusation (and proof?) of murder!! And despite the seeming impossibility of proving that in a court of law, Holmes essentially blackmails Klein with it, by promising not to report it to the authorities if she founds Mrs. Maberley's trip, and breaks off her engagement to Duke and leave England forever!!! Which she does!!

Also, Granada makes Mary Maberley Douglas' grandmother, instead of his mother. Go figure...

**Man, Sir Arthur was using "Three" a lot in his stories. Three Gables, Three Garridebs, Three Students, Missing Three Quarter...you're making it very confusing for us to remember which story was which, Sir!!

**Good old Watson: "...the slight clatter which I made as I picked up the poker." Always ready to leap to Holmes' aid.

**If Holmes actually knew something of the murder of "young Perkins," why hadn't he gone to the authorities with it? Or did he just have his suspicions, which he was able to conveniently used to scare Dixie? Does he have a lot of "I suspect but can't proves" in his arsenal, ready to dispense when needed?

**Mrs. Maberley's note said, "I have had a succession of strange incidents occur to me in connection with this house." Yet, as far as we can tell, there was only one incident: someone trying to buy the house with odd conditions attached to the sale. Did other things happen, that she never bothered to tell us about? There was no sign of threats, or break-ins, or anything, right? Or was one eccentric, rich anonymous person trying to buy your house enough to justify hiring a detective?

**Then again, Mary was familiar with Holmes work: "I believe that my late husband, Mortimer Maberley, was one of your early clients." Holmes says, "it is some years since he used my services in some trifling matter."

So a minor, apocryphal case...

**Watson, architecture critic, on the house name Three Gables: "the house, a brick and timber villa, standing in its own acre of undeveloped grassland. Three small projections above. the upper windows made a feeble attempt to justify its name."

**Apparently, Douglas Maberley was the talk of the town. Holmes:

But of course all London knew him. What a magnificent creature he was!...I have never known anyone so vitally alive. He lived intensely -every fibre of him!"

One can only wonder at what inspired such fame and adoration for a minor diplomat.

**Mary: "You remember him as he was -- debonair and splendid. You did not see the moody, morose, brooding creature into which he developed. His heart was broken. In a single month I seemed to see my gallant boy turn into a worn-out cynical man."

Holmes: "A love affair -- a woman?"

Mary: "Or a fiend."

Hmmm. Does Mary know that Isadora was the one who broke Douglas' heart and spirit? That "fiend" comment suggests she knew something. It's a pity she wasn't more forthcoming. as she could have saved Holmes some time hanging around with gossip columnists!

Also? When Holmes says. "A love affair--a woman?" Is he implying that maybe it wouldn't have been a woman? That he suspected Douglas of having...ahem...other interests? It just seems odd to insert that qualifier in there, in that way, if you didn't have some reason to think that maybe it wasn't a woman...

**Of course, someone willing to considerably overpay for a house could be an indication of evil-doing. Or it could be a sign of a housing bubble with imminent economic collapse coming...

**This "Haines-Johnson" and Klein make a bit of a mistake by over-egging the offer a fair bit.

Buy the house and all the furniture for far more than market price? No problem. But language in the contract stating that she "could not legally take anything out of the house -- not even your own private possessions?" And his explanation to her, "'Well, well, some concession might be made for your personal effects. But nothing shall go out of the house unchecked," is obviously going to be unacceptable to a woman of "refinement and culture."

There should have been some way to make that contract more subtle, without forcing Mrs. Maberley to an option that anyone would see as offensive and unacceptable--not to mention immediately alerting her lawyer that something odd was going on.

**What other options existed?

Douglas effects had arrived "last week," and been untouched, "piled in a corner." Surely the wicked maid Susan knew his luggage was there, unopened. Surely she and her cronies should have known that Douglas' novel must be there. Couldn't Susan have searched Douglas' things? Offered to unpack them for Mrs. Maberley? Mary had no idea that the novel even existed--she would never notice that it was missing?!?!

Surely Mary was not at much as a shut-in as Garrideb was. Break in (or have Susan let you in) while she's at the market, or visiting friends, or at church. Why do you need to rush in and chloroform her, especially when you must know, through Susan, that Mary has no idea the manuscript exists? What's the infernal rush?

Offer Mary the contract, without the offensive clauses. Include her moving expenses as part of the deal. Stockdale and his gang pose as movers, and search the trunks while in transit...or even switch them out entirely.

There were an awful lot of options available before resulting to insane contracts and break-ins that involved physically assaulting an old woman.

**Holmes catching Susan eavesdropping: "He strode across the room, flung open the door, and dragged in a great gaunt woman whom he had seized by the shoulder. She entered with ungainly struggle like some huge awkward chicken, torn, squawking, out of its coop."

**Isadora may have felt that Susan and Barney were "good hounds who run silent."

But look at what Holmes is able to get out of Susan in about 30 seconds:

"Suppose I tell you that it was Barney Stockdale to whom you spoke?" said Holmes.

"Well, if you know, what do you want to ask for?"

"I was not sure, but I know now. Well now, Susan, it will be worth ten pounds to you if you will tell me who is at the back of Barney."

"Someone that could lay down a thousand pounds for every ten you have in the world."

"So, a rich man? No; you smiled -- a rich woman. Now we have got so far, you may as well give the name and earn the tenner."

So in quick order, Holmes gets Susan to admit she's with Stockdale, and that they're working for a wealthy woman.

Klein really shouldn't be confident of her droogs' ability to stay silent when Sherlock Holmes on the case.

**Holmes being very pawkey with Susan:

"Just a little wheezy, Susan, are you not? You breathe too heavily for that kind of work."

"Now, Susan, wheezy people may not live long, you know. It's a wicked thing to tell fibs."

"Good-bye, Susan. Paregoric is the stuff..."

See, he's laying the insults on everybody this case,. not just Dixie...

**Every homeowner's dream: "You don't happen to have a Raphael or a first folio Shakespeare without knowing it?"

**Sherlock is on a roll this day: "I was wondering whether [the previous owner] could have buried something. Of course, when people bury treasure nowadays they do it in the Post-Office bank. But there are always some lunatics about. It would be a dull world without them."

Of course, now there's BitCoin. Then again, people are buying gold as a safety investment again these days, so maybe there are some more folks burying things in their back yards...

And yes, there are always some lunatics about.

**Holmes and Watson ask Mary in about three different ways whether or not something new had come into the household lately. It does make her look a little bit dotty to not think about the "several trunks and cases" that were lying there in plain sight.

**At their second encounter, Steve Dixie avers to help Holmes if he can, and Sherlock replies that "that the lady in that house, and everything under that roof, is under my protection."

So, did Steve take part in the break in? He certainly didn't inform Holmes about it, before or after...does Sherlock follow up on his threat to tell the authorities about the murder of Perkins?

**As mentioned above, I think not showing us Langdale Pike is a lost opportunity:

...his human book of reference upon all matters of social scandal. This strange, languid creature spent his waking hours in the bow window of a St. James's Street club and was the receiving station as well as the transmitter for all the gossip of the metropolis. He made, it was said, a four-figure income by the paragraphs which he contributed every week to the garbage papers which cater to an inquisitive public. If ever, far down in the turbid depths of London life, there was some strange swirl or eddy, it was marked with automatic exactness by this human dial upon the surface. Holmes discreetly helped Langdale to knowledge, and on occasion was helped in turn.

What a delicious description. Obviously Pike is one of the many agents Holmes employed later in his career, and, despite Watson's obvious distaste, could have been a fascinating character to meet. It also would have been nice to hear his stories about Douglas and Isadora first hand, and not have Holmes pull them out as a surprise reveal many (many) pages later.

Some commentators have said that "Langdale Pike" is such an obviously false name, that it somehow proves that this story was not canonical. Please...many a gossip columnist--not to mention dealers in secret information--have used pseudonyms.

**After the break-in, we meet "a bustling, rubicund inspector, who greeted Holmes as an old friend."

This is the only case where Doyle doesn't name the inspector. Who is it? Why not name him? Why not use Lestrade or one of the old stand-bys?

Perhaps since the inspector is portrayed as a racist and a bigger than usual dolt, Doyle didn't wish to sully Gregson et. al. with this character...

**Unnamed inspector is incompetent, and pompous about being incompetent!

Mary:"There was one sheet of paper which I may have torn from the man that I grasped. It was lying all crumpled on the floor. It is in my son's handwriting."

"Which means that it is not of much use," said the inspector. "Now if it had been in the burglar's --"

"Exactly," said Holmes. "What rugged common sense! None the less, I should be curious to see it."

The inspector drew a folded sheet of foolscap from his pocketbook. "I never pass anything, however trifling," said he with some pomposity. "That is my advice to you, Mr. Holmes. In twenty-five years' experience I have learned my lesson. There is always the chance of finger-marks or something."

Idiot.

**Douglas was certainly not destined to win any writing awards:

". . . face bled considerably from the cuts and blows, but it was nothing to the bleeding of his heart as he saw that lovely face, the face for which he had been prepared to sacrifice his very life, looking out at his agony and humiliation. She smiled -- yes, by Heaven! she smiled, like the heartless fiend she was, as he looked up at her. It was at that moment that love died and hate was born. Man must live for something. If it is not for your embrace, my lady, then it shall surely be for your undoing and my complete revenge."

It must have been fun for Sir Arthur to deliberately write so badly...

**This is the 3rd time in Case-Book when a woman of Latin American origin has played a substantial role in the story, having married a wealthy American or European and come home with him. I wonder what was going on in Sir Arthur's life that brought that about...

**That being said, Doyle does tell us that Isadora "is pure Spanish," and "her people have been leaders in Pernambuco for generations." But Pernambuco is in Brazil, which was under Dutch and then Portuguese control!! It's not impossible a Spanish family could have lived there, of course...

**Holmes describes Klein as "the richest as well as the most lovely widow upon earth." Wow. I'm not sure how extensive his research on that esoteric topic is, though.

Meanwhile, Watson may not be 100% in agreement, at least on the beauty part, as he noes "The lady had come, I felt, to that time of life when even the proudest beauty finds the half light more welcome."

As to the "wealthiest" part? The reason Isadora rejected Douglas' pleas for marriage was that he was "a penniless commoner." And nothing was more important to her then "her life's ambition" to marry a young duke, so it was "imperative" to avoid scandal. Money, and perhaps royal title, were still of great importance to her, no matter how wealthy she may have been.

**Quite a humourous bit from Watson:

A machine-like footman took up our cards and returned with word that the lady was not at home.

"Then we shall wait until she is," said Holmes cheerfully.

The machine broke down.

"Not at home means not at home to you," said the footman.

Ha ha!

**Holmes: "Surely no man would take up my profession if it were not that danger attracts him." And, by hiring goons to warn him away, Isadora "forced me to examine the case of young Maberley."

Yet another reason pursuing some alternate, easier plans for obtaining the manuscript might have been in order...

**Kudos to Isadora for being bright enough to burn the manuscript immediately, unlike many another mysteries where the criminal keeps evidence around for no good reason.

**The fickle winds of fate--if Douglas hadn't died of pneumonia, he would have sent the other copy of the (awful) manuscript to the publisher from Italy, and it would have been printed. Talk about lucky...and perhaps the reason Granada chose to make Isadora's actions the (not quite believable) cause of his illness and death. Because we don't like to think of fortune favoring the wicked like that...

**Holmes: "I am not the law, but I represent justice so far as my feeble powers go."

Well, this is no murderer he is freeing in this case. Yes, she is a fairly nasty "belle dame sans merci," ruthless and cruel...but that is hardly a crime. The actual crime, burglary and assault, are not nothing, but no one was seriously hurt. And Mrs. Maberley wasn't even aware of what was lost, and wasn't hurt substantially by its taking.

Still, it was a crime, and as Holmes notes, Mrs. Klein does like to play with "edged tools," so more incidents were not unlikely in the future.

So, a tough call on the feeble powers of justice here. Certainly Mrs. Maberley wouldn't have been too happy with a lurid scandal involving her dead son, either. And she does get to travel around the world the substantial check from Klein, AND she gets to keep her house and furniture! And perhaps becoming a Duchess will encourage Klein to end her questionable associations and illegal activities. So, justice?!?

**I would have loved a scene where Sherlock hands a big check to Mrs. Maberley, and tells her to go on a world cruise, but can't tell it who it's from or what it's about, or explain the mysteries of the offer to buy the house, or the break-in. Is it justice to keep your client in the dark...?

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE BLANCHED SOLDIER!!

The Adventure Of The Illustrious Client--The Incomplete Story Of Miss Kitty Winter!!

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 01 Nov 2015 13:00:00 +0000

I won't lie--I'm not a big fan of The Adventure Of The Illustrious Client.

Sorry. I know that's not much of a lead-in. No deep thoughts, no underlying metaphors, no discourses on what the story tells us about Victorian/Edwardian society.

To a large extent, that's because we have already covered this story before. On a fundamental plot level, Illustrious Client is the exact same story as Charles Augustus Milverton. Except it's not as good.

In both tales, Holmes is hired to protect an upper class woman from the mechanizations of an evil, evil man. After a meeting with the villain that proves Holmes has nothing in his detective arsenal to thwart the villain, Sherlock resorts to burglarizing the bad guy's home. He succeeds, but is almost caught, when a former female victim shows up and physically neutralizes the villain.

Yes, there are some differences. But these are basically the same stories. You'll recall that I wasn't fond of the Milverton story as a Sherlock Holmes story, and Illustrious repeats many of those missteps. There is no mystery to solve--we know who the bad guy is, there's never any question about that. There's no whodunnit, howdunnit or whydunnit. Hell, unlike Milverton, there's not even a crime being committed. Sherlock makes no deductions in either story, and the greatest detective of all time simply resorts to blunt force breaking and entering to "solve" the case. An outside party steps in to settle the villain's hash.

On another level, Illustrious Client just seems to be, well, a seedier, seamier story. If you disregard the speculation over the identity of the client, you're left with a tale that could as well come from some penny dreadful. Holmes is hired not to solve a crime, but to break up an engagement. He's a fixer, not a detective!! Baron Gruner may be murderer, but his chief interest seems to be using and discarding woman. He keeps a "lust book": "Snapshot photographs. names, details, everything about them. It was a beastly book -- a book no man, even if he had come from the gutter, could have put together." We get precious few details about the women he has "ruined," but one of those victims throws acid in his face, and we spend several paragraphs in a rather grisly description of the resulting injuries.

Yuck.

Yet, ironically, I found I wanted far more detail about one character in particular: Miss Kitty Winter. She's obviously of great importance in the tale--she tells Holmes about Gruner's diary; she goes with Holmes to try and convince Violet de Merville that her fiance was a snake; Holmes grabs her to help find the diary in his study; and of course she gains her vengeance by tossing vitriol on him. She's feisty, she's likable (well, at least until the acid-throwing), she's the most colorful and vital and interesting character in the story.

But we need more details to make her character work within the story. Perhaps it was due to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Victorian prudishness, but we never learn exactly how the baron wronged Kitty. He clearly didn't murder her. He pretty clearly didn't rob her of any family fortune, as the story (and both of the TV adaptations) portray her as lower class.

What then, did Gruner do to Miss Winter to make her a raving maniac whenever his name comes up? We never find out. When she has her confrontation with Violet, Kitty neglects to say a single word about what the baron did to her--negating the reason she came in the first place!! She merely comes across as a madwoman because of that, constantly raving and never explaining, which weakens her position in the narrative. It's hard to take sympathy with someone's cries from justice, when we never know what the injustice was to begin with.

When tried for the "grave crime of vitriol-throwing," "Such extenuating circumstances came out in the trial that the sentence, as will be remembered was the lowest that was possible for such an offence." What extenuating circumstances? Why aren't we told at any point in the story what actually happened to her?

Clearly Gruner did more than "love her and leave her," or cheat on her, because that certainly doesn't seem like it would be extenuating enough to let her off lightly for what could have been charged as an attempted murder.

Did he leave her with child, or force her into an abortion? Make her participate in some particularly degrading sexual acts? Did he prostitute her? Did he beat her? The Granada adaptation showed us that Gruner had scarred her neck and chest with acid himself, which makes her fury more understandable, and her acid-throw at him seem at least somewhat justified.

But in the printed story, we have no idea of what motivates Kitty Winter, unless there are some coded words and phrases in the story which made sense to a 1920s fan that now escape the modern reader. But I think Doyle was just being too delicate and discreet--a gentleman shouldn't write of such things! Yet by eliding past any actual explanations, he weakens the character, and makes us question the justice of her actions.

Holmes also treat Miss Winters very oddly. After Gruner's goons attack him, he insists that Watson get her out of town, because she is danger:

Tell Shinwell Johnson to get that girl out of the way. Those beauties will be after her now. They know, of course, that she was with me in the case. If they dared to do me in it is not likely they will neglect her. That is urgent.

But just six days later, Holmes drags Kitty along to Gruner's residence!! How unbelievably callous--"you're in grave danger from this man, now come with me to his house?!?" No wonder she brought acid!! Holmes' reason, "But I had to be sure of the position of the book, and I knew I had only a few minutes in which to act...therefore I gathered the girl up at the last moment" makes little sense. In their first meeting, Kitty had told Holmes, "How can I tell you where [the book] is now? It's more than a year since I left him." It seems a very slender thread upon which to justify bringing the woman along, risking both her safety and her arrest for abetting a felony, when the lust book might not even be in the same location.

So, as promised, no particularly deep thoughts. It's just a story I don't particularly like, and the most interesting character, who could have tied everything together much better, is underdeveloped to the point of actually harming the narrative.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**For what it's worth, Sir Arthur was quite pleased with this story, telling a friend in a letter that he considered it among the top six Sherlock Holmes stories.

Well, I'm a terrible judge of my own writing, too.

**Holmes tells Watson that "it can't hurt now" to write up this adventure.

"Now" would seem to imply that earlier it hadn't been all right to tell it. Since the tale occurred in 1902, and was published in 1924, obviously something--or several somethings--had changed in the intervening 22 years.

Edward VII, most people's choice for the "illustrious client," had of course died in 1910. So there could be no fear of upsetting him--although certainly his part in tale can only make him look good, unless he were embarrassed as having been seen interfering in a society wedding. Or perhaps, given tales of Edward's past, there is a deeper reason--perhaps he is really Violet's father?!?

If Baron Gruner were still alive, some of what Watson recorded here might seem actionable--actually accusing him of a murder, assaulting detectives and of "ruining" young women, at the least. So perhaps he had passed.

The only other person who might care would be Violet de Merville, for being made to look like such a fool. She probably wouldn't be too happy that the circumstances of the breaking of their engagement be made public. Surely she had actually married by this point. Perhaps she had left the country, or maybe she had passed in the intervening decades, as well...

**"Both Holmes and I had a weakness for the Turkish bath." Do they even have Turkish baths anymore? There don't seem to be any in my neck of the woods...

**A number of commentators suggest that the following is Sherlock Holmes snidely tweaking an upper class twit:
...said Holmes with a smile. "Don't you smoke? Then you will excuse me if I light my pipe.

See, Sir James Damery had not taken off his elegant gloves, and he was a bit of a dandy, so Holmes asking him if he wanted to spoke was supposedly the detective's way of subtly criticizing him for not having taken off his gloves to shake hands with them, and...

No, I really don't see that, sorry. And neither the 1965 BBC adaptation nor the Granada version do anything with that either--they show not a trace of Sherlock taking umbrage or making merry.

No, if you want a suggestion of Holmes' being so insolent, you really have to go to his reading Damery's missive: "It may be some fussy, self-important fool; it may be a matter of life or death..."

Of course, Holmes hadn't met Damery yet, and only knew of his reputation as a "fixer" and high society diplomat.

And to be honest, Damery isn't a twit at all. He doesn't take issue with Watson joining in. He doesn't talk down about people from lower classes, or from America. He shows ample respect for Holmes' power, acknowledging that Holmes could easily deduce Damery's patron if he tried. He makes sure that Holmes will "have a free hand." He listens with "deepest attention." Damery certainly comes across as much more likable and friendly than, say, Lord Cantlemere in Mazarin Stone or Lord St. Simon in Noble Bachelor. Really, the only reason Holmes could have to subtweet Damery as folks claim is that Holmes objected to his being a clothes horse.

No, if Doyle is having Holmes take the piss with Damery, it's far too subtle for me to see (or understand why).

**Despite my misgivings about the story as a whole, Watson's (and Holmes'!) character descriptions are amazing, deep and rich. When they first meet Colonel Damery:

...many will remember that large, bluff, honest personality, that broad, cleanshaven face, and, above all, that pleasant, mellow voice. Frankness shone from his gray Irish eyes, and good humour played round his mobile, smiling lips. His lucent top-hat, his dark frock-coat, indeed, every detail, from the pearl pin in the black satin cravat to the lavender spats over the varnished shoes, spoke of the meticulous care in dress for which he was famous.

Again, Watson doesn't seem to be tweaking him, either, unless "meticulous care in dress" is a subtle shot. But this reads to me like an approving assessment of the man, not a criticism at him.

**Damery on Gruner: "I should say that there is no more dangerous man in Europe."

Holmes seems a bit dismissive: "If your man is more dangerous than the late Professor Moriarty, or than the living Colonel Sebastian Moran, then he is indeed worth meeting."

Of course, Gruner does a good job of having the crap kicked out of Holmes by minions...and Holmes is not able to outwit him. So Damery's description seems apt.

**Damery: "To revenge crime is important, but to prevent it is more so."

Of course, what Gruner is doing is no crime. As distasteful as it might seem, a cad marrying a well-to-do woman isn't illegal--even if his previous wife came to a bad end.

**Damery: Gruner "has been fortunate in some rather shady speculations and is a rich man, which naturally makes him a more dangerous antagonist."

So, wait--he made his money from "shady" investments? He didn't murder his first wife for her money? Than why did he kill her?

And if he is already well off, why is he so insistent on marrying Violet? For more money? For the sheer sadism? Or...does he really love her?

**Holmes doesn't like anonymous clients: "I am accustomed to have mystery at one end of my cases, but to have it at both ends is too confusing."

**Ah, the mysterious client.

I will credit Doyle for this much--the use of this device helps disguise how much this story is merely a re-run of Milverton.

If Damery himself had been the client--or General de Merville--we wouldn't be so wrapped in speculation, deduction and argument over the identity of the "illustrious" gentleman. And without those "bookends" around the story, we might notice its weaknesses more easily.

Perhaps its just because I'm an American, but I get no particular thrill over pondering which high-born noble person is secretly Holmes' patron in this case. One prince or baron or king is as good as another to me.

Of more interest is why, exactly, King Edward (or whomever) was so adamant that "his honoured name has been in no way dragged into the matter," that his "incognito not be broken." Perhaps there was some social/class taboo; perhaps a reigning monarch simply couldn't be seen to interfere in non-royal matters. Or, as I asked above, perhaps there's some secret relationship between the monarch and the maid...

Than again, since Holmes' detection abilities were never used in this case, it is interesting that the Emperor of The British Empire didn't have someone available for burglary and undercover dirty work, without involving an outsider an commoner and risking the story getting out. "007, we have as job for you..."

**And one very important point about the plot device of the secret, illustrious client?

Sir James carried away both it and the precious saucer. As I was myself overdue, I went down with him into the street. A brougham was waiting for him. He sprang in, gave a hurried order to the cockaded coachman, and drove swiftly away. He flung his overcoat half out of the window to cover the armorial bearings upon the panel, but I had seen them in the glare of our fanlight none the less. I gasped with surprise.

Seriously, bro, if you want to keep your client's identity a secret, you don't drive around in a carriage bearing his coat of arms!!!!!!!!!! Good gravy, that's a really stupid and amateurish bit of business...

**Baron Gruner is a ladies' man:

The fellow is, as you may have heard, extraordinarily handsome, with a most fascinating manner. a gentle voice and that air of romance and mystery which means so much to a woman. He is said to have the whole sex at his mercy and to have made ample use of the fact.

**He also, apparently, does a brilliant job of innoculating his "victims" against anyone telling bad stories about him:

The cunning devil has told her every unsavoury public scandal of his past life, but always in such a way as to make himself out to be an innocent martyr. She absolutely accepts his version and will listen to no other.

Gee, if I had known it was that easy to make a woman forgiving of my flaws, well, a lot of my relation ships might have gone differently...

**This story is the first, and sadly only, appearance of Shinwell Johnson:

During the first years of the century he became a valuable assistant. Johnson, I grieve to say, made his name first as a very dangerous villain and served two terms at Parkhurst. Finally he repented and allied himself to Holmes, acting as his agent in the huge criminal underworld of London and obtaining information which often proved to be of vital importance. Had Johnson been a "nark" of the police he would soon have been exposed, but as he dealt with cases which never came directly into the courts, his activities were never realized by his companions. With the glamour of his two convictions upon him, he had the entree of every night-club, doss house, and gambling den in the town, and his quick observation and active brain made him an ideal agent for gaining information.

And Holmes:

"Johnson is on the prowl," said he. "He may pick up some garbage in the darker recesses of the underworld, for it is down there, amid the black roots of crime, that we must hunt for this man's secrets."

In other stories in the Case-Book, Watson has mentioned "agents" that Holmes used in his latter days. Shinwell is one of the few we ever actual meet.

It's an intriguing set-up, but Johnson doesn't actually do anything in the story except find Kitty Winter and introduce her to Sherlock, which seems to be considerably beneath the talents that Watson and Holmes lay out in his description.

**Watson's description of Shinwell: "a huge, coarse, red-faced, scorbutic man, with a pair of vivid black eyes which were the only external sign of the very cunning mind within."

**Holmes: "Woman's heart and mind are insoluble puzzles to the male. Murder might be condoned or explained, and yet some smaller offence might rankle."

Well, that's maybe a little bit sexist, Sherlock...

**Holmes description of Gruner:

He is an excellent antagonist, cool as ice, silky voiced and soothing as one of your fashionable consultants, and poisonous as a cobra. He has breeding in him -- a real aristocrat of crime with a superficial suggestion of afternoon tea and all the cruelty of the grave behind it...Some people's affability is more deadly than the violence of coarser souls.

**Holmes' attempts to sway Gruner are particularly ineffective:

No one wants to rake up your past and make you unduly uncomfortable. It is over, and you are now in smooth waters, but if you persist in this marriage you will raise up a swarm of powerful enemies who will never leave you alone until they have made England too hot to hold you.

The baron calls his bluff rather easily, and Holmes is no more effective than he was against Milverton.

**Gruner on his power over women: "You have heard of post-hypnotic suggestion. Mr. Holmes. Well you will see how it works for a man of personality can use hypnotism without any vulgar passes or tomfoolery."

Some have taken that to mean that Gruner actually did use some form of hypnosis to enchant Violet.

How silly--it's obviously a metaphor.

**Watson, after hearing of Gruner's threats against Holmes: "Must you interfere? Does it really matter if he marries the girl?"

My thoughts exactly. It's not as if she's being forced, and if she wants to be a damned fool despite the efforts of everyone in her life, well, it's a free country.

**Watson's description of Miss Winter: "a slim, flame-like young woman with a pale, intense face, youthful, and yet so worn with sin and sorrow that one read the terrible years which had left their leprous mark upon her."

**Nice turn of phrase: "If I can help to put him where he belongs, I'm yours to the rattle."

**Having called out Holmes for sexism, I feel obliged to point out Watson's take on the difference between men and women: "There was an intensity of hatred in her white, set face and her blazing eyes such as woman seldom and man never can attain."

**Holmes' description (as transcribed by Watson) of Violet:

I don't quite know how to make her clear to you, Watson. Perhaps you may meet her before we are through, and you can use your own gift of words. She is beautiful, but with the ethereal other-world beauty of some fanatic whose thoughts are set on high. I have seen such faces in the pictures of the old masters of the Middle Ages...she waved us into our respective chairs like a reverend abbess receiving two rather leprous mendicants. If your head is inclined to swell. my dear Watson, take a course of Miss Violet de Merville.

Sounds charming, doesn't she?

That's a difficulty with the story, and any adaptations: if you portray Violet as a young, flighty thing--the type you'd think might easily fall for a bad man--than the hold Gruner has on her really isn't such a big deal. We've probably all known someone like that who fell in love with the wrong man.

But you have to be careful not to overcorrect. Yes, build up Miss de Merville so Gruner's ability to enchant her is impressive. But don't make her such an unpleasant--and I hate to use the term--"ice queen" that she becomes an unsympathetic character. Unfortunately, that's how far Doyle took it. Her voice is "like the wind from an iceberg." No one "could not bring one tinge of colour to those ivory cheeks or one gleam of emotion to those abstracted eyes." "There was something indescribably annoying in the calm aloofness and supreme self-complaisance of the woman whom we were trying to save."

Now, in fairness, these were all Sherlock's descriptions. Perhaps, had Watson met her, her might have found warmer, more charitable words to draw her picture. Then again, when Sherlock Holmes says that you're being frosty and unemotional, well, he knows what he's talking about!!

When the hero of your story tells us the woman they're trying to help is icy and aloof and haughty and, well, unpleasant, it really dispels any sympathy the audience might have for her plight, and instead leaves us thinking that she probably deserves Gruner.

**So besotted is Violet, and so arrogant, that she actually believes that she is heaven's agent: "If his noble nature has ever for an instant fallen, it may be that I have been specially sent to raise it to its true and lofty level."

Oh, barf.

**I had noted this above, but it's worth mentioning again. When Kitty has her chance to tell Violet everything that Gruner had done to her...she doesn't mention a single thing. Not one. Instead, she harangues Violet, insulting her, and ultimately physically attacking her. No wonder the gambit failed!

**It's an indication of Sherlock's fame at this point in his career that an attack on him rates as front page news.

It's also fun to see that--as in The Six Napoleons--Holmes has mastered using the press to confuse his foes.

**Watson is a medical doctor, right? He seems all too willing to listen to news reports and other doctors' reports, rather than actually taking a look for himself. It's difficult to believe that Watson didn't insert a line of two along the gist of "my experience told me Holmes was right, and the injuries looked worse than they were" or some such.

**"There was a curious secretive streak in the man which led to many dramatic effects, but left even his closest friend guessing as to what his exact plans might be." Or, translated: Sherlock Holmes is a jerk!

**Watson:

The same evening papers had an announcement which I was bound, sick or well, to carry to my friend. It was simply that among the passengers on the Cunard boat Ruritania, starting from Liverpool on Friday, was the Baron Adelbert Gruner, who had some important financial business to settle in the States before his impending wedding to Miss Violet de Merville, only daughter of, etc., etc.

That does seem a little intrusive, for the press to be printing up the comings and goings of people, and passengers lists for ships, and the like. Certainly, an American would bemoan the invasion of privacy (well, at least pre-9/11).

It is mighty convenient, though. Had they not printed that notice, Holmes wouldn't have known to act in time...

**The whole gambit regarding Watson posing as an expert and connoisseur of Chinese pottery fails to work as a story element for two separate reasons.

First, we were told early in the story that Gruner had written a book on the subject. Now, it's either not credible, or extraordinarily foolish on Watson's part, to believe that during his 24 hour cram session on the subject, he didn't read Gruner's book. Either way, it makes it ridiculously easy for Gruner to disbelieve Watson's story.

Secondly, not once does Watson actually use any of that knowledge he stuffed into his head. Not once. Oh, sure, he name drops a bunch of things earlier in his narration. But go reread his meeting with Gruner--not once does he bring up a single fact that he had learned. The entire conversation would play exactly the same had Watson never picked up a single book on Chinese pottery. Watson evades, deflects or ignores every one of Gruner's queries and tests. Considering that he was playing for time, this is inexcusable. John might as well have spent that 24 hours napping.

And just how hard would it have been to come up with a vaguely plausible provenance for the Ming saucer? "The father of one of my patients had served in the Opium Wars, and when he died he left this box full of plundered antiquities to his son. Knowing my interest in such things...blah blah blah." At least that would have Gruner off guard for a few more minutes, rather than instantly being suspicious.

So, either we are to believe that Watson is a complete dunce, or that Sir Arthur did a particularly poor job writing that gambit.

**Watson's description of Baron Gruner:

He was certainly a remarkably handsome man. His European reputation for beauty was fully deserved. In figure he was not more than of middle size, but was built upon graceful and active lines. His face was swarthy, almost Oriental, with large, dark, languorous eyes which might easily hold an irresistible fascination for women. His hair and moustache were raven black, the latter short, pointed, and carefully waxed. His features were regular and pleasing, save only his straight, thin-lipped mouth. If ever I saw a murderer's mouth it was there -- a cruel, hard gash in the face, compressed, inexorable, and terrible. He was ill-advised to train his moustache away from it, for it was Nature's danger-signal, set as a warning to his victims. His voice was engaging and his manners perfect. In age I should have put him at little over thirty, though his record afterwards showed that he was forty-two.

**Sherlock really isn't a very good burglar, is he?

Then something struck upon [Gruner's] ear, for he stood listening intently...Beside [the window], looking like some terrible ghost, his head gin with bloody bandages, his face drawn and white, stood Sherlock Holmes. The next instant he was through the gap, and I heard the crash of his body among the laurel bushes outside.

Holmes didn't get away cleanly while breaking into Milverton's crib, either...

**Again, Doyle goes a bit grand guignol here, devoting 4 long paragraphs to the effects of the acid thrown in Gruner's face. Yuck.

**This story does a better job than most Holmes' tales of giving us some resolution.

Still, I can't help but feel cheated by not seeing Violet receiving and reading Gruner's diary. Not chivalrous of me, I know...but Doyle does such a fine job of making her unbelievably arrogant, I'd love to see her get her comeuppance.

**Sherlock Holmes was threatened with a prosecution for burglary, but when an object is good and a client is sufficiently illustrious, even the rigid British law becomes human and elastic. My friend has not yet stood in the dock.

In other words, the fix was in, and The Man got Sherlock off the hook. In effect, he had been granted His Majesty's License To Burgle.

Still, not matter what a scumbag Baron Gruner was, or how "good" the cause is, it really doesn't show British law in a very good light when you can burgle a man's home and maim him with acid and no one pays any real penalty. Vigilante justice, sponsored and protected by The Crown. That's more the hallmark of a despotic regime than a just democracy...

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE THREE GABLES!!

The Adventure Of The Three Garridebs--Robin Hood's Eleven?

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 18 Oct 2015 12:00:00 +0000

There is one type of crime that audiences love.

No, not murder, not blackmail, not securities fraud, not jaywalking--although of course these all have their fans.

No, what the public loves--and loves so much that they revere the criminals as heroes--are con artists. Grifters. Players of The Long Game.

Which brings us to The Adventure Of The Three Garridebs.

Garridebs is the third of a "trilogy" involving elaborate scams to set up robberies and other crimes. In The Red-Headed League, most famously, John Clay lived under an assumed name for months, and came up with a so-crazy-it-must-be-true story to get Jabez Wilson to leave his shop every day while Clay tunneled into a nearby bank vault.

In Stockbrokers Clerk, the thieves convince a young clerk not to take up his new position at a prestigious firm, and come to work for them, while one of their crew took Pycroft's place and trued to burgle a hundred thousand pounds from their safe.

And here, in Garridebs, "Killer" Evans assumed a false identity and concocted another "too-crazy-not-to-be-true" scheme with a ridiculous bequest, to get poor Nathan Garrideb to leave his quarters for a few hours so Evans can get to a secret room with counterfeiting equipment and hundreds of thousands in queer bills.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's plots for these tales have been critiqued by some as too unbelievable (and too similar...we'll deal with that later).

Yet in a number of ways, Doyle was prescient, for a whole sub-genre of crime fiction followed these tales--the scam, the long con, and in some aspects, the heist.

In modern times, we have a vast supply of grifter fictions--and we love them. The Lady Eve. The Music Man. The Sting won an Oscar as best picture. Ocean's 11, followed decades later by Soderbergh's Ocean's Eleven. The television shows Leverage and Hustle. Paper Moon. Inception. Mission Impossible--not the movies, which I love, but the television series, which was a different beast altogether, as every week the IMF essentially ran a brilliant confidence game to trick the bad guys and leave them baffled about where their money/prisoner/technology had disappeared to. The list goes on and on--and in a real way this Holmes "trilogy" is the father of all of those stories.

But as a precursor to the genre, these Doyle stories do differ in a few ways from the modern form of many of these tales. Somewhere in the past century, sentiment has shifted, and such scam artists--at least in our entertainment media--have become the good guys!!

In modern day confidence entertainments, the crooks are the heroes, portrayed as modern day Robin Hoods. They're the heroes. No one rooted for the cops to catch Danny Ocean or Henry Gondorff--the audience wants to see them succeed.

Of course, in a series of stories where Sherlock Holmes is the hero, any opposing him must be a villain. So, even if we admire their wits, no one roots for John Clay or Killer Evans or the Beddingtons to succeed--if they did, it would only lessen our regard for Sherlock Holmes!!

Part of the Robin Hood transformation of the genre came in the choice of villain. In the classics of the genre, our con artists don't go after the little guy; they don't rob grandmothers of their nest eggs or trick the witless with Nigerian email scams, as real life confidence men might. No, the modern grifter in entertainment goes after bad people--the victims are the villains! In The Sting, they were trying to defraud a gangster who had murdered a colleague. The IMF went after "organized crime" or dictatorial governments. Every week, the guys on Leverage went after evil corporations or millionaires who had ruined someone's life, or otherwise had it coming. When Jim Rockford put on an elaborate long game, it was to recover money from the people who had swindled it from Richie Brockelman's parents. The modern Ocean's movie go after wealthy and corrupt casino owners.

The opposite was true in the Holmes stories. First, Doyle had the people who hired Sherlock be sympathetic, if not pitiable, characters. Jabez Wilson, Hall Pycroft and Nathan Garrideb aren't the true victims of the scam--they're just the gulls who are being moved out of the way so the crooks can get to the real goal. Those three wouldn't have lost much if the scams had succeeded (although Pycroft surely never got his original job back, and so was unemployed...and Garrideb went insane from disappointment!!). But they put a human face on the crimes, so we're less inclined to root for the robbers.

We should also note that showing us some innocent victims cuts against an aspect that modern scam movies and TV shows choose to downplay or ignore--they may not be so victimless. The security guard that gets tricked away from his post, the secretary who is fooled into giving up private info, the tech guy who lets the heroes place cameras everywhere...these people would all likely be humiliated and fired in the aftermath of the scams, especially if the "victim" corporations and billionaires are as evil as portrayed. But we're distracted by all the "balls in the air" as the scripts juggle many scam threads in front of us, and we forget to ask about the inevitable collateral damage. Yeah, it's all wonderful fun in Ocean's Thirteen when Danny and the crew ruin Willy Banks' new casino. But what about the thousands of people who work there? They lose their jobs, right?

Meanwhile, the victims of the scams in the Holmes stores are mostly faceless corporations, or the government, instead of gross millionaires who deserve to be scammed. There's never any hints that these con games might in some way be justified. We meet Mr. Merryweather, the banker. He is a bit of an arrogant twit, but nothing so severe as to make the audience root for his bank to fail. We never meet anyone from Mawson And Williams--it's just a stock brokerage, and there is no indication that they in any way deserved to be robbed. And in Garridebs, counterfeiting is presented as a bad thing, no questions asked. There can be little doubt that if these tales were retold today, though, that each company and the government would be portrayed as in some way "asking for it," with the crime itself portrayed as not hurting any "innocents."

Finally, in modern con entertainments, quite often our grifters explicitly disdain the use of guns and violence. In Ocean's Thirteen, Linus berates a rival thief for being so inelegant as to use a gun, instead of succeeding through guile and wits. The IMF crew could go entire seasons without a cast member holding a gun (although they were all too willing to leave victims to be later killed by angry superiors/partners). Leverage had a tough guy, but he was there for fisticuffs, and he refused to use lethal weapons. That's part of the new Robin-Hood mythology, you see--if these new "heroes" are to truly be heroes, they can't use guns and kill people. Tricking people with your mind and clever schemes? Admirable. Coercing them with deadly force? Not so much.

Yet the Holmes con artists were all far more violent. John Clay brought a gun with him, which Holmes knocked out of his hand with a riding crop. Beddington murdered a watchman in cold blood at Mawson & Williams. And Killer Evans was indeed a killer, convicted of manslaughter, and he actually took two shots at Watson. You couldn't find starker contrast between these older stories and modern scam entertainments--in the past scammer were vile villains, ready to kill to finish the jobs. That can't happen with our modern day Robin Hoods, or they wouldn't be heroes.

We love to watch people who are exceedingly clever. We love to watch heroes who are there to help the little guy. We love to watch heroes who can successfully go undercover in crazy disguise. We love to watch heroes who are willing to take the law into their own hands (but only up to a point). But with Sherlock Holmes, we already had a hero who fulfilled all of those qualities. So the con men, the players of the long game, even if clever, had to fail, and be shown to be morally retrograde.

But that's changed in modern fiction, to a large degree. There is no Sherlock Holmes to protect us. The banks and brokerages and the government are now often viewed as the bad guy. Who can protect the little people? Only those bold enough to nominally break the law, to take on unjust and overwhelming economic power armed only with wit and guile--just like Robin Hood, the bad guy has become the hero, and breaking the law is justified in the name of justice.

Unfortunately, in real life, the confidence men are usually also real villains, and the innocent and downtrodden are their victims. Just ask those victimized by Bernie Madoff--he was no Robin Hood. A thief is a thief, and while it may be entertaining, perhaps it's foolish to lionize even a fictional group of them in the name of "sticking it to the man." Because 99 times out of a hundred, they're sticking it to you.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**A lot of people mark this story down because of the huge similarity to Red-Headed League. And that's a fair enough observation: both scams involve using an alleged American millionaire making crazy conditional bequests in his will to complete strangers to get someone away from their place of business or residence so the crooks can get in to access ill-gotten goods.

Of course, if a type of con works, there's no reason that other crooks wouldn't use the same scam in the future. It's not like there's been only one Ponzi scheme in history, and people have been running variations of the Spanish Prisoner trick for centuries.

Still, fictional narratives have different demands than real life, and repeating yourself during a series of stories is seen as laziness, not efficiency.

But if you ask me, the bigger problem with Three Garridebs is that Killer Evans is a fairly big idiot. His scheme is nowhere as near as airtight as the one John Clay used in Red-Headed League. And Evans was hot-headed, as well as being a poor liar. Holmes has the scheme pretty much figured out after "Garrideb's" first visit.

It is the lack of a worthy enemy, rather than the originality of the scheme, that hurts The Three Garridebs.

**Granada worked The Three Garridebs into their adaptation of The Mazarin Stone. There, Evans was trying to get into Garridebs apartment because the secret room held the workshop of a deceased jewel cutter and fence, and he need to get in because it held the only tool in England capable of cutting up the great Mazarin Stone.

Bah.

**Watson tells us, "It may have been a comedy, or it may have been a tragedy...Yet there was certainly an element of comedy."

It's difficult to see any comedy, unless you think that doddering old Nathan Garrideb is a ridiculous figure.

Remember, Watson and Holmes did laugh at poor Jabez Wilson and his consternation in Red-Headed League...perhaps they thought that victims of con men were fitting subjects for mockery?

**Before this story, Holmes had recently "refused a knighthood, for services which may be someday described." Why refuse it?

Ironically, this story was written soon after Arthur Conan Doyle himself had had been knighted--and he accepted!

**Garrideb really is a non-existent name--apparently no one in the world has been found, then or now, who ever actually had that surname.

Fitting choice as a name for this plot, then. But my question is...where did Doyle come up with it? Did he just generate a random name, and then check the phone directory or census to see if it was really rare? Did he take a variation on a real name? Or were there real Garridebs once, but the line died out (as it would have in this story, as Nathan had no children and no prospects for breeding?)

**What plot would Evans have come up with if Nathan had been named Smith?

Surely it couldn't have been that hard to get Garrideb out of the house for a bit--perhaps a fake flier for an auction or sale at Sotheby's or Christie's, which Garrideb was known to attend. Or perhaps a fawning letter from another "collector," asking Nathan to come as an expert to examine some rarities--that would certainly appeal to Nathan's vanity.

**Watson describing Evans: "...with the round, fresh, clean-shaven face characteristic of so many American men of affairs."

Still, that's not a compliment, it seems: "The general effect was chubby and rather childlike, so that one received the impression of quite a young man with a broad set smile upon his face."

So many American businessman are chubby and childlike? Well, OK, I'll give you Donald Trump? Still...

**Watson again: "His accent was American, but was not accompanied by any eccentricity of speech."

Well, let's be clear here: American don't have accents--the English do. And what the hell do you mean by "eccentricities?"

**Holmes sussing out Evans right away:

"You are, of course, the Mr. John Garrideb mentioned in this document. But surely you have been in England some time?"

"Why do you say that, Mr. Holmes?" I seemed to read sudden suspicion in those expressive eyes.

"Your whole outfit is English."

**Perhaps a man named "Killer" doesn't have the proper demeanor to be a top-tier con man, as he loses his cool pretty easily at the least sign of someone scrutinizing his story.

"Why did he ever drag you into it at all?" asked our visitor with a sudden outflame of anger. "What in thunder had you to do with it? Here was a bit of professional business between two gentlemen, and one of them must needs call in a detective! I don't want police butting into a private matter."

Dude, you're supposed to be playing a role here, and you're blowing it!

**So, were American millionaires making really odd bequests common in those days? Was it a common common entertainment trope? Is there any chance of someone I've never heard of leaving me $5 million bucks?

**Evans: "It was the queerest will that has ever been filed in the State of Kansas."

That should have been easy enough for Holmes to verify, right? A quick telegram to one of Sherlock's police or press friends in America?

**"It's five million dollars for each if it is a cent..."

That was quite the princely sum, worth more than $100 million in 2010 dollars.

Some sources put the net worth of the top 1% in Victorian England at a mere $265,000, according to Leslie Klinger in The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes. Which means Evans was promising to make Garrideb wealthier than almost everyone else in the country. No wonder his head was turned.

**Evans falls for a rather obvious ploy by Holmes: "I used to have a correspondent -- he is dead now -- old Dr. Lysander Starr, who was mayor in 1890."

Again, this is an example of how poorly qualified Evans was for a job like this. He should have performed at least some minimal research, in case someone asked a question like this. Or a better answer, perhaps..."I don't follow politics?" "I would have been a child then?" etc.,

**As it is, Holmes has the falsehood of the whole enterprise figured out before the fake Garrideb left.

"I was wondering, Watson, what on earth could be the object of this man in telling us such a rigmarole of lies. ...The whole of this Garrideb invention was apparently for no other end. I must say, Watson, that there is a certain devilish ingenuity about it, even if the queer name of the tenant did give him an opening which he could hardly have expected. He wove his plot with remarkable cunning."

**Holmes spots another transparent lie from Evans:

There have been no advertisements in the agony columns. You know that I miss nothing there. They are my favourite covert for putting up a bird, and I would never have overlooked such a cock pheasant as that.

Seriously, the man went to confront Holmes without being prepared in any way whatsoever.

**Holmes: "I think the fellow is really an American, but he has worn his accent smooth with years of London."

I thought we covered that--you guys are the ones with accents, not us! Enough of this anti-American propaganda!

**The "real" Garrideb:

...a very tall, loosejointed, round-backed person, gaunt and bald, some sixty-odd years of age. He had a cadaverous face, with the dull dead skin of a man to whom exercise was unknown. Large round spectacles and a small projecting goat's beard combined with his stooping attitude to give him an expression of peering curiosity. The general effect, however, was amiable, though eccentric.

**Today, Garrideb would likely be described as a hoarder:

[The room] was both broad and deep, with cupboards and cabinets all round, crowded with specimens, geological and anatomical. Cases of butterflies and moths flanked each side of the entrance. A large table in the centre was littered with all sorts of debris, while the tall brass tube of a powerful microscope bristled up among them. As I glanced round I was surprised at the universality of the man's interests.

**Seriously, is Garrideb already wealthy enough?

With no visible means of income, he maintains his household, and spends his time collecting anything and everything. It seems he was fairly well off.

But Garrideb begs to differ:
"No, sir. I am not a rich man. It is a good collection, but not a very valuable one..."

Later, though, he tells us

There are a dozen specimens in the market at the present moment which fill gaps in my collection, and which I am unable to purchase for want of a few hundred pounds. Just think what I could do with five million dollars.

If filling the "gaps" in your collection would take "a few hundred pounds," what must the bulk of the collection itself be worth?

Certainly there might be some thieves interested in that. And surely you have sufficient things to sell if you need money...

**Of course, the victim's ego is crucial in many con games: "Why, I have the nucleus of a national collection. I shall be the Hans Sloane of my age."

Dream high, Nathan Garrideb. Dream high!

**More anti-Americanism (although this time it is Evans trying to justify Garrideb traveling to Birmingham): "Why should he believe what I tell him? But you are a Britisher with solid references, and he is bound to take notice of what you say."

**Evans finishes with, "I would go with you if you wished, but I have a very busy day to-morrow, and I could always follow you if you are in any trouble."

Busy doing what?!? Your whole story is that you were in England to look for Garridebs. You claim you've found one, and now you have something more important to do?!?!

**Clever repartee:

"Our little problem draws to a close," said he. "No doubt you have outlined the solution in your own mind."

"I can make neither head nor tail of it."

"The head is surely clear enough and the tail we should see to-morrow.

**More proof that when it comes to clever schemes, Evans is a complete nitwit, as his "advertisement" was riddled with errors easily spotted, even by Watson:

"I saw that the word 'plough' was misspelt."

"Oh, you did notice that, did you? Come, Watson, you improve all the time. Yes, it was bad English but good American. The printer had set it up as received. Then the buckboards. That is American also. And artesian wells are commoner with them than with us. It was a typical American advertisement, but purporting to be from an English firm."

Seriously, these are minor league errors, especially when you're facing Sherlock Holmes!

**"Garrideb's" true identity:

'James Winter, alias Morecroft, alias Killer Evans,' was the inscription below." Holmes drew an envelope from his pocket. "I scribbled down a few points from his dossier: Aged forty-four. Native of Chicago. Known to have shot three men in the States. Escaped from penitentiary through political influence. Came to London in 1893. Shot a man over cards in a night-club in the Waterloo Road in January, 1895. Man died, but he was shown to have been the aggressor in the row. Dead man was identified as Rodger Prescott, famous as forger and coiner in Chicago...Very dangerous man, usually carries arms and is prepared to use them.

**Some have questioned why, when the infamous forger Prescott died, the police didn't search his residence for his counterfeiting works.

The answer is fairly obvious, as Holmes tells out directly: Prescott rented his flat under an assumed name!

The previous tenant was a gentleman at large named Waldron. Waldron's appearance was well remembered at the office. He had suddenly vanished and nothing more been heard of him. He was a tall, bearded man with very dark features. Now, Prescott, the man whom Killer Evans had shot, was, according to Scotland Yard, a tall, dark man with a beard.

Obviously, a known criminal would use an alias, lest his hideout be easily found.

**Evans entering the flat: "Then came the sharp, metallic snap of a key, and the American was in the room."

Where did he get a key?!?

Presumably, when he saw Garrideb off at the train station, he either surreptitiously lifted it, or borrowed it from Nathan on some pretext ("I left my briefcase at your apartment earlier").

**As we discussed above, unlike the "modern" version of the con men, Evans would anger Matt Damon by resorting to gunplay, even after he is caught:

His face turned upon us with a glare of baffled rage, which gradually softened into a rather shamefaced grin as he realized that two pistols were pointed at his head...In an instant he had whisked out a revolver from his breast and had fired two shots.

**Watson has been wounded by bullets before, perhaps more than once. So when he describes his pain , he's not whining: "I felt a sudden hot sear as if a red-hot iron had been pressed to my thigh."

If this tale was not explicitly dated in 1902, we could use it to answer the enigma of Watson's "wandering gunshot wound."

**Perhaps the grandest moment in the Holmes/Watson friendship:

Then my friend's wiry arms were round me, and he was leading me to a chair. "You're not hurt, Watson? For God's sake, say that you are not hurt!" It was worth a wound -- it was worth many wounds -- to know the depth of loyalty and love which lay behind that cold mask. The clear, hard eyes were dimmed for a moment, and the firm lips were shaking. For the one and only time I caught a glimpse of a great heart as well as of a great brain. All my years of humble but single-minded service culminated in that moment of revelation.

His face set like flint as he glared at our prisoner, who was sitting up with a dazed face. "By the Lord, it is as well for you. If you had killed Watson, you would not have got out of this room alive.

**Holmes can't be bribed, and asserts that it's a property of all Englishmen:

"Yes, sir," said our prisoner, staggering slowly to his feet and then sinking into the chair. "The greatest counterfeiter London ever saw. That's Prescott's machine, and those bundles on the table are two thousand of Prescott's notes worth a hundred each and fit to pass anywhere. Help yourselves, gentlemen. Call it a deal and let me beat it."

"We don't do things like that, Mr. Evans. There is no bolthole for you in this country."

**Evans, on why he didn't just kill or incapacitate Garrideb in the first place: "It would have been easy enough, but I'm a soft-hearted guy that can't begin shooting unless the other man has a gun also."

Let's remember that he shot three men in America, as well as Prescott. Hardly soft-hearted, I think.

**A key question--at this point, what exactly can Evans be charged with?

"But say, Mr. Holmes, what have I done wrong, anyhow? I've not used this plant. I've not hurt this old stiff. Where do you get me?"

"Only attempted murder, so far as I can see," said Holmes. "But that's not our job. They take that at the next stage."

At least Evans seems to be fairly clever in facing the legal possibilities of his acts.

Perhaps he could be charged with trespassing, as well? And surely, posing as a lawyer must have been an offense?

**Garrideb, sadly, was crushed by the disappoinment of not recieving $5 million:

We heard later that our poor old friend never got over the shock of his dissipated dreams. When his castle in the air fell down, it buried him beneath the ruins. He was last heard of at a nursing-home in Brixton.

Watson, in his introduction, told us that Garrideb had "lost his reason," so his "nursing-home" is not merely a quiet retirement.

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE ILLUSTRIOUS CLIENT!!

The Adventure Of The Sussex Vampire--The Giant Rat Of Sumatra!!

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 04 Oct 2015 12:00:00 +0000

One of the more fascinating aspects of any continuing fictional enterprise is the sheer amount of what we don't know, but want to know.

Even in a series that has had hundreds of episodes, all the background cannot be filled in--yet the reader or viewer has an insatiable demand to know. What was Picard's first command, the Stargazer, like? The Doctor left Amy and Rory behind for months--what adventures did he have then? No matter how many adventures we're given, the audience craves more.

Which brings us to The Adventure of The Sussex Vampire.

Sussex Vampire is a treasure trove of the "apocryphal stories," the untold stories that Watson or Holmes keep referring to, that sound so fascinating.

Holmes turns to the V section in his index. And what does he find?

Victor Lynch, the forger. Venomous lizard or gila. Remarkable case, that! Vittoria, the circus belle. Vanderbilt and the Yeggman. Vipers. Vigor, the Hammersmith wonder.

And that's just some of the V's!! (And if I ever start a band, it will be called Vigor The Hammersmith Wonder. And no, we will never play Hammersmith.

In fairness, Watson tell us that the Index isn't just old cases, as they are "mixed with the accumulated information of a lifetime." So sure, maybe some of those were just news stories Holmes kept clippings on. But aside from "The Voyage Of The Gloria Scott," which we know was an actual case, the "gila lizard" was a "remarkable case," as well. And we have a mix of the seemingly prosaic--"Victor Lynch, the forger"--with the interesting, macabre, or just plain baffling. Vittoria the circus belle? Vanderbilt and the Yeggman?!? Vigor, the Hammersmith wonder?!?!?! How can we not be fascinated by those "titles," and crave to know more?

Of course, the capstone is perhaps the most infamous apocryphal case of all, as the law firm references a job Holmes once did for them:

"Matilda Briggs was not the name of a young woman, Watson," said Holmes in a reminiscent voice. "It was a ship which is associated with the giant rat of Sumatra, a story for which the world is not yet prepared."

Oh, come on now! No matter what you think of the Sussex Vampire, you want that story to be put on the back burner immediately, and have Holmes tell us all about Matilda Briggs and The Giant Rat Of Sumatra!! (Sounds like a great title for a YA book!!) A mysterious ship!! A giant rat?!? A story for which the world is not yet prepared?!?! Why aren't we prepared?!?! It's a hundred years later--we're damn well prepared now!! OMG, tell us now!!!!!

Do you see what a little off-hand reference can do to us? Because we love or Holmes and Watson, because we want to know everything about them, these tantalizing tidbits that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle loved to pepper his tales with are alluring, engaging, frustrating, and absolutely brilliant.

Why does this seem so unique to the Sherlock Holmes Canon? Well, first of all, Doyle did it A LOT. There were 60 stories and novels. Depending on how you count them (is an off-hand mention actually a unique case?), there are over 100 "unreported cases" mentioned in those stories. Over 100!!!! Click here for a list of the most colorful-sounding 61 of the untold tales.

Think about that--61 (and probably dozens more) apocryphal cases!! That's double what we already have!! You could make an entire alternate Canon out of those!!!

Even when other fictive universes do something like this, the named-dropped off-screen apocrypha rarely seem substantial enough to justify a whole episode. If they have a good enough idea, the creators will actually use it, and make the story. Eventually, Hellblazer had to explain what happened at Newcastle. Not Doyle! He would take these wonderful concepts--Bert Stevens, the mild-mannered murderer--and just leave them laying around for us!! "Merridew of abominable memory"? What does that even mean?!? Other series wouldn't just drop something like that--they follow up, if for no other reason than "fan service."

But the amazing, frustrating, novel thing was, Doyle almost never followed up. The Adventure of The Second Stain was, maybe, an exception--twice Watson told of "the story of the second stain," each time sounding like a completely different case...and then he actually gave us a tale with that title, that seemed in most ways to contradict two prior references. Other than that, though? The Vatican cameos? The bogus laundry affair? The peculiar persecution of John Vincent Harden? The repulsive story of the red leech? Doyle was tossing off multiple story ideas nearly every month--and then not using them!!

And that's another thing--these seemed like ideas for actual stories, for the most part. A lot of times, when other genre series do something like this, it's just tidbits of personal information: Why was Spike called William The Bloody? Han Solo making the Kessel Run? They're character-building tidbits, valuable in and of themselves. Yet there's usually not an entire story there...but Watson and Holmes were name-dropping entire cases, and telling us how remarkable they were! Indeed, most of the apocrypha has been used as the basis for pastiches--each often several times!

We're not satisfied with the weekly, or monthly, adventures of our various heroes. We want to think that they're like us--"something is happening every day"--and better than us--"something INTERESTING is happening every day"! That's why we have literally thousands of novels (of varying canonicity) for Star Trek and Star Wars, for Doctor Who and for Buffy, for Monk and for Columbo--because fans are hungry for more, more, more of their heroes.

But perhaps Doyle realized that, as Spock said, having is not so pleasing a thing as wanting. After all, actually seeing Kirk cheat and beat the Kobayashi Maru was not nearly so entertaining as our imaginations made it, was it? Maybe Doyle was right to just tease us, because could the actual case of Wilson the notorious canary-trainer ever live up to our imaginations? How could the story of the depth which the parsley had sunk into the butter ever be as wonderful as we story we created in our own minds? If Doyle had ever sat down to write The Darlington Substitution Scandal, maybe it would have turned out to be as poor a story as The Mazarin Stone!

Perhaps, then, it's for the best that Sir Arthur never wrote The Adventure Of The Giant Rat Of Sumatra. Perhaps it's in the perfect form already, in our minds and imaginations, each of us with our own personal version of what happened aboard the Matilda Briggs.

...

Naaaah. Someone get me a time machine. I'm going make to force Doyle to write the damn story!!

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**Sussex Vampire is a fine story, but it does have a glaring problem: A large story element is a virtual repeat from two stories earlier.

In both this story and Thor Bridge, a wealthy white man travels to South America, woos and weds a woman from there, brings her to England, and only then realizes that they have nothing in common, and feels that he's falling in love with her, despite her hot "tropical" love for him:

This gentleman married some five years ago a Peruvian lady the daughter of a Peruvian merchant...The lady was very beautiful, but the fact of her foreign birth and of her alien religion always caused a separation of interests and of feelings between husband and wife, so that after a time his love may have cooled towards her and he may have come to regard their union as a mistake. He felt there were sides of her character which he could never explore or understand. This was the more painful as she was as loving a wife as a man could have -- to all appearance absolutely devoted.

Granted, there were two years between the publications of these stories, so it perhaps wasn't as noticeable contemporarily. But reading the stories consecutively, it's a blindingly obvious and annoying rerun.

Why did Sir Arthur resort to the exact same set up so soon? Why return the the "white guy marries Latin American woman and cools in his ardor but she loves him more" motif, with just one story between? Was this a pressing phenomenon in Britain of the 1920s (or maybe the 1890s, when the stories were likely set), with wealthy men taking foreign wives and then regretting it? Did Doyle know a couple like this, and was sending someone a coded "message," or even a rebuke? Was he running out of ideas?

Given the similar setups, we have to consider the ethnic/gender stereotypes being portrayed. White males are portrayed as, if not mislead, then at least temporarily bewitched by exotic foreign women. It's only after marriage and returning to normal, stable England that they realize that there love was merely based on physical passion, and they have "nothing in common." Ah, but the hot. "tropical" love of the woman will not fade, and is regarded by the rich white man as "immature" or overly passionate.

Is Doyle perpetuating these stereotypes, or critiquing them? Is he warning against taking foreign wives, are suggesting that the men are ninnies for "falling out of love" with their brides while the women remain devoted?

I honestly don't have the answers.

**There are differences, of course. Certainly, in this story, the wife does not use her own suicide to frame a rival for murder. Indeed, she goes to ridiculous lengths to keep from accusing anyone. And she's only referred to as "tropical" once!

But did you notice...the wife is never named in this story at all? Not even once?!? She's not even referred to as "Mrs. Ferguson'!! She is always referred to as "my wife" or "your mistress" or "the woman." We do not know her name!! A pivotal character, the accused "vampire," the woman who saved her child's life...has no name.

That's extraordinarily careless of Doyle, to leave such a strong character completely nameless throughout the entire tale. Wasn't anyone editing his work at this point?

Of course, the baby is also never given a name. It's always referred to "the baby" or "my child."

What an odd household, where 1/2 of the inhabitants (not counting servants, of course) can only be called by, "Hey, you!"

**Holmes, introducing the best lawyer letter ever: "For a mixture of the modern and the mediaeval, of the practical and of the wildly fanciful, I think this is surely the limit."

It is a masterpiece of British understatement:

Re Vampires

SIR: Our client, Mr. Robert Ferguson, of Ferguson and Muirhead, tea brokers, of Mincing Lane, has made some inquiry from us in a communication of even date concerning vampires. As our firm specializes entirely upon the assessment of machinery the matter hardly comes within our purview, and we have therefore recommended Mr. Ferguson to call upon you and lay the matter before you.

Wonderful. And the echoing of it at the end, in Sherlock's reply, is most gratifying.

**We've discussed it before, but this story quite distinctly summarizes Holmes' skepticism, and disdain for any "supernatural" cases.

"But what do we know about vampires? Does it come within our purview either? Anything is better than stagnation, but really we seem to have been switched on to a Grimms' fairy tale."

"Rubbish, Watson, rubbish! What have we to do with walking corpses who can only be held in their grave by stakes driven through their hearts? It's pure lunacy."

Ever practical Watson, even though more open-minded, doesn't accept the supernatural. Perhaps there are more prosaic causes that are misinterpreted as the work of the undead?: "The vampire was not necessarily a dead man? A living person might have the habit. I have read, for example, of the old sucking the blood of the young in order to retain their youth."

Yet Holmes rejects it out of hand: "But are we to give serious attention to such things? This agency stands flat-footed upon the ground, and there it must remain. The world is big enough for us. No ghosts need apply."

"The idea of a vampire was to me absurd. Such things do not happen in criminal practice in England."

This seems a pretty strong of principal, without any loopholes. But that doesn't stop people from writing stories where Holmes does indeed pursue vampires and things that go bump in the night. Some have gone so far as to suggest that Van Helsing was actually Holmes in disguise, and Dracula was actually Moriarty!! Sigh...

I think we know what Sherlock himself would say about these efforts.

**For what it's worth, most chronologists set Sussex Vampire before Bram Stoker's famous novel was published, so vampire legends would not have been quite so prevalent in the consciousness of Holmes and Watson. Had the story been set later, Holmes likely wouldn't have needed to grab his index to look up obscure foreign references to vampires.

**As we've noted before, it seems as if all houses in England at the time--especially estates of the wealthy--had names: "I know that country, Holmes. It is full of old houses which are named after the men who built them centuries ago. You get Odley's and Harvey's and Carriton's -- the folk are forgotten but their names live in their houses."

**Holmes didn't always give credit for the sources of his vast knowledge: "It was one of the peculiarities of his proud, self-contained nature that though he docketed any fresh information very quietly and accurately in his brain, he seldom made any acknowledgment to the giver."

**The letter from Ferguson: "It concerns a friend for whom I am acting."

It's comforting to know that even Victorians used this dodge. "Well, doctor, my friend has this problem..."

Holmes, of course, has no patience for such stumbling shyness:

"'Your case!'"

"We must not let him think that this agency is a home for the weak-minded. Of course it is his case...It is simpler to deal direct," said Holmes

**Holmes perhaps betraying Doyles' attitude on over-hasty marriages abroad: "I gather that you did not know your wife well at the time of your marriage?" "I had only known her a few weeks."

Holmes seems somewhat disapproving here. Perhaps Doyle is being critical of men sweeping foreign women off their feet, uprooting them from their homes, and then "falling out of love" when the first blush of physical passion finally fades.

**So, to Ferguson at least, Catholicism is an "alien religion"?!?

I'm presuming that, coming from Peru, she is Catholic--so perhaps I'm just as guilty of stereotyping as anyone speaking of her "tropical" passion.

But surely Catholicism is not so completely "alien" to Ferguson's (presumed) Protestantism? Was her religion a surprise to him? Who married them?

Or did his concerns about her religion emerge only after the passion cooled (and she had borne him a child)?

**More from Ferguson and his fading ardor: "He felt there were sides of her character which he could never explore or understand. This was the more painful as she was as loving a wife as a man could have -- to all appearance absolutely devoted."

Well, you could try, oh, I don't know, actual conversation? Try talking to your wife?!? Building a relationship on communication?!? (Maybe start by finding out her name?)

Jesus, this guy pisses me off.

**Even if you don't buy the vampirism idea any more than Holmes did, there certainly is strong reason to be suspicious about Mrs. Ferguson's behavior:

Twice the wife was caught in the act of assaulting this poor lad in the most unprovoked way. Once she struck him with a stick and left a great weal on his arm...she saw her employer, the lady, leaning over the baby and apparently biting his neck. There was a small wound in the neck from which a stream of blood had escaped. The nurse was so horrified that she wished to call the husband, but the lady implored her not to do so and actually gave her five pounds as a price for her silence...he saw his wife rise from a kneeling position beside the cot and saw blood upon the child's exposed neck and upon the sheet. With a cry of horror, he turned his wife's face to the light and saw blood all round her lips. It was she -- she beyond all question -- who had drunk the poor baby's blood.

This provide ample reason for concern, surely.

So it strains credulity that the wife cannot be bothered to make any explanation whatsoever of her behavior. The entire story is over if she just speaks up. But instead she chooses to remain silent about the fact that someone is trying to murder their baby!

"She would not even speak. She gave no answer to my reproaches, save to gaze at me with a sort of wild, despairing look in her eyes. Then she rushed to her room and locked herself in. Since then she has refused to see me."

Even when an outsider, who wouldn't be heartbroken at the news about Jack, tends to her, she can only babble in vague generalities: "No. No one can help. It is finished. All is destroyed. Do what I will, all is destroyed."

Holmes explanation: "She saw it made and saved the child's life, and yet she shrank from telling you all the truth, for she knew how you loved the boy and feared lest it break your heart."

And she confirms this: "How could I tell you, Bob? I felt the blow it would be to you. It was better that I should wait and that it should come from some other lips than mine."

I can sympathize with her dilemma. BUT SOMEONE IS TRYING TO MURDER YOUR BABY! And she was willing to tell the nurse, so her insistence on silence was hardly absolute. Why not tell Watson? Why wait until Holmes has figured out the whole story to come out and confirm it?

Silly, silly plot device.

**Sherlock on Watson: Holmes looked at me thoughtfully and shook his head. "I never get your limits, Watson," said he. "There are unexplored possibilities about you.

**Watson on the sad physical ravages of aging:

There is surely nothing in life more painful than to meet the wreck of a fine athlete whom one has known in his prime. His great frame had fallen in, his flaxen hair was scanty, and his shoulders were bowed. I fear that I roused corresponding emotions in him.

**Ferguson: "How am I to go to the police with such a story?" Well, SOMEONE WAS TRYING TO MURDER YOUR BABY!!!! I would think that, no matter what the explanation, protecting your offspring would be big enough a priority to act.

Seriously, I rather like this story, but this whole Victorian "I can't bear to cause the one I love any upset, and I can't bear the weight of any potential scandal" emotional repression is really driving me nuts...

**Obviously, Bob Ferguson has no idea what a 15 year old boy is really like:

"Yet you say he is affectionate?"

"Never in the world could there be so devoted a son. My life is his life. He is absorbed in what I say or do."

Obviously, adolescence in Victorian England wasn't the same as in modern America (or England). But we'll see how odd a duck Jack is soon enough.

**Of course, Holmes has already solved the mystery by the end of the first meeting: "He would certainly seem to be a most interesting lad. There is one other point about these assaults. Were the strange attacks upon the baby and the assaults upon your son at the same period?"

He knows, all right.

**However, Holmes upbraids himself for jumping the gun by rushing to conclusions: "One forms provisional theories and waits for time or fuller knowledge to explode them. A bad habit, Mr. Ferguson, but human nature is weak. I fear that your old friend here has given an exaggerated view of my scientific methods."

**Even without a real vampire, Cheeseman's seems a fine setting for a Gothic tale: "An odour of age and decay pervaded the whole crumbling building."

**Inside Cheeseman's: "There was hung a fine collection of South American utensils and weapons, which had been brought, no doubt, by the Peruvian lady upstairs."

Wait--so Peruvian brides bring weapons collections as their dowry?!? Weapons still coated with poison?!?! And display them on the walls?!?

Not to disagree with Watson, but it seems at least as likely that the collection is Robert Ferguson's, picked up in his business travels to Peru. That would increase the irony of his providing what he no doubt thought of as mere trophies being used to kill his infant son...

**The paralyzed dog provides the final confirmation that Holmes needs.

But it's also the take-off point for a lot of criticism of the story, as countless people insist that curare would not leave a lingering paralysis in the dog.

But these people need to read the story more carefully. Holmes did not say it was curare. His exact quote was "curare or some other devilish drug."

"Some other drug." Ahem.

**Watson as medical man: "On the bed a woman was lying who was clearly in a high fever. She was only half conscious, but as I entered she raised a pair of frightened but beautiful eyes and glared at me in apprehension."

So was she actually physically ill? Or was it an emotional breakdown? It has been awhile since we've seen "brain fever," where extreme emotional duress provoking dangerous sickness.

Watson seems to go with the brain fever possibility: "I took her pulse and temperature. Both were high, and yet my impression was that the condition was rather that of mental and nervous excitement than of any actual seizure."

Of course, we could also speculate that her health problems may have been caused by accidentally ingesting the poison sucked out of the baby's neck...

**Watson, appealing Ferguson's case to the wife: "He is full of grief, but he cannot understand."

Her reply: "No, he cannot understand. But he should trust."

Hold on, Ma'am..YOU don't trust him! You refuse to tell him one syllable of the truth. Sheesh...

**The father is always the last to know...

To modern eyes, at least, the descriptions of Jack are fairly unsettling, and even back in 1924 the reader must have gotten the sense that there was something not quite right about the lad:

He was a remarkable lad, pale-faced and fair-haired, with excitable light blue eyes which blazed into a sudden flame of emotion and joy as they rested upon his father. He rushed forward and threw his arms round his neck with the abandon of a loving girl. "Oh, daddy," he cried, "I did not know that you were due yet. I should have been here to meet you. Oh, I am so glad to see you!" Ferguson gently disengaged himself from the embrace with some little show of embarrassment...

"Jacky has very strong likes and dislikes," said Ferguson, putting his arm round the boy. "Luckily I am one of his likes." The boy cooed and nestled his his head upon his father's breast. Ferguson gently disengaged him.

Again, this is a 15 year old boy...

**Unlike earlier stories, where the very physical appearance of someone of mixed ethnicity was a justifiable cause for horror, Watson approves of the unnamed baby: "a very beautiful child, dark-eyed, golden-haired, a wonderful mixture of the Saxon and the Latin."

Quite a contrast from early pictures of horrifying race mixing, as in Wisteria Lodge...

**Holmes admits that he solved the case before even getting out of his chair at Baker Street:

"It has been a case for intellectual deduction, but when this original intellectual deduction is confirmed point by point by quite a number of independent incidents, then the subjective becomes objective and we can say confidently that we have reached our goal. I had, in fact, reached it before we left Baker Street, and the rest has merely been observation and confirmation."

**"Did it not occur to you that a bleeding wound may be sucked for some other purpose than to draw the blood from it? Was there not a queen in English history who sucked such a wound to draw poison from it?"

This is a reference, although likely apocryphal, to Eleanor of Castille, who allegedly saved Edward I's life during a Crusade by sucking a wound he received from a poisoned knife.

**Again, the father may have been to close to see what was fairly obvious to an outside observer:

It is the more painful because it is a distorted love, a maniacal exaggerated love for you, and possibly for his dead mother, which has prompted his action. His very soul is consumed with hatred for this splendid child, whose health and beauty are a contrast to his own weakness.

**The worst prescription in the history of crime-fighting: "I think a year at sea would be my prescription for Master Jacky," said Holmes, rising from his chair.

WHAT?!?!?!

Look, this youngster has been poisoning pets and trying to murder infants. Jacky is a serial-killer waiting to happen, right? Can anybody seriously believe that "a year at sea" would cure him of his pathology? That a little salt air would heal his "distorted, maniacal, exaggerated love" and "soul-consuming hatred"? When Jacky comes home in a year, would you going let him anywhere near the child? Near the wife? Around any pets?

I'm sorry, Sherlock, but two counts of attempted murder calls for something a little stronger than a vacation/exile. I fear Jacky went on to become quite the killer, and you're responsible.

**Finally, we get a bit of closure in a Holmes story--if only a bit:

Ferguson was standing by the bed, choking, his hands outstretched and quivering. "This, I fancy, is the time for our exit, Watson," said Holmes in a whisper. "If you will take one elbow of the too faithful Dolores, I will take the other. There, now," he added as he closed the door behind him, "I think we may leave them to settle the rest among themselves."

**The Granada adaptation of this story is quite possibly the worst thing that I have ever seen. It is terrible in every way possible. I will say no more.

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE THREE GARRIDEBS!

The Adventure Of The Creeping Man--"Risible Science Fiction"?

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 20 Sep 2015 12:00:00 +0000

I've discussed before why I feel that horror and supernatural stories aren't appropriate for Sherlock Holmes. Doyle himself has Holmes declare why, in The Hound Of The Baskervilles and Devil's Foot: "if...we are dealing with forces outside the ordinary laws of Nature, there is an end of our investigation.", and "I have hitherto confined my investigations to this world. In a modest way I have combated evil, but to take on the Father of Evil himself would, perhaps, be too ambitious a task."

But what happens if the Holmes story seems to cross over into science fiction, instead of horror?

Which brings us to The Adventure of The Creeping Man.

Author David Stuart Davies, in an afterword to a 2004 edition of Case-Book, dismissed Creeping Man as "risible science fiction." He's written a number of Holmes pastiches, so he has some qualifications to discuss what may or may not be appropriate for The Great Detective.

This quote gives me two things to discuss regarding Creeping Man. First, in general, are science fiction-type stories an appropriate milieu for Holmes? Secondly, is Creeping Man science fiction? And if it is, is it "risible?"

As to the first question, let me plead that I'm having to speak in overly broad generalities here--there are as many sub-genres of horror and science fiction as there are of mystery, if not more. So, as I gather my thoughts here, I'll gladly concede that of course there are exceptions to any of my pronouncements, and not all genre stories conform to the limitations I suggest.

I won't belabor the horror idea--I've covered that before, and we'll look at that again next story. But there are is one thing in particular that I feel works against horror being a fair genre for Sherlock Holmes.

Horror by its very nature is outside of Holmes wheelhouse. Sherlock is an investigator who relies on absolute physical laws of nature. He's spent his life building up, through observation and experimentation, a system for analyzing and studying crime. But without firm physical laws, that system is useless. If footprints always work like X, and tobacco ash always works like Y, then Holmes, and the police, and ultimately the courts, can rely on his deductions. But if there are beings that are super-natural, able to violate and ignore those physical laws, than Sherlock's observation and deductions become useless. "There are no footprints here, so the killer could not have gone this way--well, unless he was a vampire and turned into a bat and flew away" would make for a pretty unconvincing pronouncement from Holmes, wouldn't it? It also makes it much more difficult to solve cases, and especially to prosecute criminal in court: "Your honor, Sherlock Holmes himself concedes that a vampire could have committed the crime--that's reasonable doubt!"

And I will admit once again that this is largely based on my personal preferences. There are any number of pastiches out there where Sherlock Holmes does indeed interact with the supernatural--so obviously plenty of people don't see it the way I do. And there are plenty of works out there about police and detectives who operate in a supernatural world...and a lot of them are pretty good. Which is fine--different strokes, there's room enough for everyone's interpretations, etc. But for me, Sherlock Holmes is a character who interacts with the real world, a proto-CSI who shows how crime and the like can be investigated and solved by the human mind. Take away that real world, or rather allow the unreal to creep in, and you completely change the dynamic.

Does that same problem apply to science fiction, however?

Well, that depends.

With much science fiction, we're still dealing with the real world, with real physical laws. The creators are just extrapolating and building upon those natural rules. With sufficient education, there's no reason why Holmes couldn't opine on how the mud of my trouser cuff could only have come from the colony on Jupiter's moon, and it would be consistent with how we accept Holmes now. After all, I don't think that any current readers of The Canon can honestly say that they know for certain how mud splashes into which seat of a dog cart, or what particular callouses on on certain finger mean. We just accept Sherlock's word for it. It might as well be science fiction for those who have never been to Victorian England.

And if you wanted to lay sufficient groundwork, sure, Sherlock Holmes could recognize Dalek tracks or recognize that those bullet holes are too precise for Sand People. I'm not sure that you'd want to, but it wouldn't complete violate the precis of how the character works.

Of course, much science fiction goes far beyond that. When we have "star-children" from 2001, or god-like beings who can transport people across the galaxy instantly, we've gone well beyond what we actually know about the physical universe, and well beyond what our earth-bound detective can reasonably intuit. We've entered the realm of Clarke's Third Law: any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. And that indistinguisability from magic takes us back to the problems I have with Holmes and horror--if something isn't physically possible in Holmes' world, than there's no way his powers and faculties can be of use in solving them.

Such "magical" science fiction requires a massive suspension of disbelief, which is the opposite of what a detective story needs. Again, that produces results that I don't care for in my Sherlock Holmes stories. A "locked room" mystery shouldn't have "Well, perhaps a Metron teleported him to a planet light-years away" as a possibility.

So, science fiction could work in a Holmes story in some cases, but in many other cases would result in the same problems as horror. Where does that leave the Creeping Man, then?

At its most basic, this story is: old man injects himself with monkey serum so that he may be more virile for his younger love, but the stuff causes him to act more like a monkey.

Is this science fiction? Was it at the time?

Alvin Rodin and Jack Key, in their Medical Casebook Of Dr. Arthur Conan Doyle, relate to us the work of French physiologist Brown-Sequard, who was known for trying to invent elixirs of youth. In 1889, he announced in medical journals

that he had injected himself with testicular secretions pf guinea pigs and dog, and felt "rejuvenated" as a result. He reported that he was now able to engage in sexual relations with his new, younger wife, whereas previously he had found his capabilities limited.

That summary is by Leslie Klinger in The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes.

Well, that certainly sounds pretty on point to the case of Professor Presbury, doesn't it? Of course, it was mostly quackery. But quackery was not uncommon in medicine, even into the 1920s, when Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote Creeping Man. Hell, there were even doctors advocating transplanting actual whole glands from monkeys into humans at the time. Obviously, "science" wasn't what it is now, but this was (unsupported, unproven) scientific thought of the era, not "science fiction."

And much in the way that Devil's Foot seemed prescient of future developments in pharmacology, is Creeping Man in any way out of step with 2015? We still have people slaughtering endangered species because their body parts supposedly increase "virility" and "vigor." And check the spam folder in your email--"boner pills" are a billion dollar business, and even the existence of real medications that actually do improve sexual performance doesn't stop the hunt for newer, cheap, non-presricption-required pills or supplements that will "make her scream in pleasure." An entire industry is based on making men feel inadequate and ashamed of their sexual performance. In that light, the decision of Professor Presbury to seek a little something to put some extra steam in his stride wholly modern, and not "risible science fiction."

And we also know now, with actual medical certainty, that hormones and endocrines and other chemicals that you put into your body can have a tremendous effect on you mentally, as well as physically. Just look at some of the side effects attributed to steroid use, for example, and compare them with the way people describe Presbury's transformation:

"He became furtive and sly. Those around him had always the feeling that he was not the man that they had known, but that he was under some shadow which had darkened his higher qualities....His naturally violent nature is intensified by it..."Apart from his queer fits, he has actually more energy and vitality than I can ever remember, nor was his brain ever clearer."

Becoming stronger, more energy and vitality--but accompanied by mood swings, mania, disproportionate anger, a tendency towards violence? Much of that could come straight out of any reporting from the last 15 years over the dangers of steroids or other performance enhancing drugs. This sounds like many of the descriptions of "'roid rage." Creeping Man is decades ahead of its time in forecasting the dangers of trying to improve oneself, sexually or athletically, through putting gosh knows what into your body.

So, the part where injecting yourself with monkey serum makes you physically act like a monkey? Yeah, that's probably bullshit. But it's not as if the professor had physically transformed into a monkey. And such a serum probably could cause unexpected physiological and behavioral changes. Do we question whether a dog could detect the "monkey juice" in Presbury, and react violently? Well, modern science has given some credence to the theory that dogs can detect cancer in humans because of the different chemicals that malignancies emit--so is a canine detecting similar changes is his master so completely out-of-bounds?

Of course, Doyle meant a lot of this on an allegorical level, as did Stevenson in Doctor Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, of Mary Shelley in Frankenstein. He didn't intend it merely as a condemnation of dangerous and untested medicine, but also as a moral parable about knowing and being content with ourselves:

"The real source," said Holmes, "lies, of course, in that untimely love affair which gave our impetuous professor the idea that he could only gain his wish by turning himself into a younger man. When one tries to rise above Nature one is liable to fall below it. The highest type of man may revert to the animal if he leaves the straight road of destiny."

And Doyle amplifies that by opining how such "crazy" medicine endangers our world and our souls:

There is danger there -- a very real danger to humanity. Consider, Watson, that the material, the sensual, the worldly would all prolong their worthless lives. The spiritual would not avoid the call to something higher. It would be the survival of the least fit. What sort of cesspool may not our poor world become?"

So, sort of like Left Behind, with the remaining population consisting only of those "base" enough to put a priority on extending their lives past their natural limits. Pretty deep for a mystery story.

Was Creeping Man science fiction, then? A bit, perhaps, but it was based on a lot of medical thinking at the time, and modern medicine has shown that much of the story is not as far-fetched as older criticisms have tried to make it seem. Doyle took one half-step into the future, as part of an allegory. It seems churlish and short-sighted to dismiss the story as "risible science fiction."

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**On the other hand, it is perfectly acceptable to dismiss the story as a poor mystery.

Indeed, there's not much "mystery" here. A respected man is behaving oddly. And...well, that's about it. The only question we have is why. No crimes have been committed, no one seems to be in any danger. There are no consequences--Sherlock promises to write a threatening letter to Lowenstein, but otherwise there is no follow-up whatsoever. We don't know if Presbury recovers; we don't know no if he resumes taking the monkey serum; we don't no the fate of his romancing of Alice; we learn nothing about the "other client" Lowenstein has in England; does Bennett end up marrying Edith? The entire story is "Oh, it's monkey hormones," a shrug, and a rush to lunch without actually resolving anything.

And since Watson is telling us this story some twenty years after it happened, there's really no excuse for his not giving us any resolution to some of these questions.

**Granada also apparently didn't think it was much of a mystery, so they seriously restructured things to try and keep the audience in the dark. Edith couldn't tell that it was her father in the window, only a vague someone or something. The fact that the dog had attacked its master wasn't revealed until much later in the story. Bennett hadn't wanted to consult Holmes, but Edith forced him. And no one suspected that anything was wrong with the professor, while the adaptation kept sowing red herrings about stolen or escaped apes.

**Watson has decided to tell us this story "if only to dispel once for all the ugly rumours which some twenty years ago agitated the university and were echoed in the learned societies of London."

What rumors?!? If Bennett and Presbury and Holmes didn't go to the authorities, what rumors would there be? "The professor had to take some time off after his dog went mad and attacked him" seems like it would have been a perfectly fine excuse to spread around. Who was telling tales out of school, then, and what were the "ugly" rumours?

By the way, Watson, telling everyone that the professor was shooting up monkey testicle juice so he could be a better lover for his young wife isn't terribly non-ugly...Surely that's as bad as any of the rumours themselves?

**"Now we have at last obtained permission to ventilate the facts..."

From whom? The professor would be 81ish at the time of the story's publication--was he still alive? Perhaps the serum was effective at extending life!

It would be odd to think that his daughter Edith had relented, if she had opposed the affair becoming public all this time. What changed? Who else could have had the right to give permission?

**Great "laconic message" from Sherlock: "Come at once if convenient -- if inconvenient come all the same. S. H."

**How Watson sees his later relationship with Sherlock:

As an institution I was like the violin, the shag tobacco, the old black pipe, the index books, and others perhaps less excusable. When it was a case of active work and a comrade was needed upon whose nerve he could place some reliance, my role was obvious. But apart from this I had uses. I was a whetstone for his mind. I stimulated him. He liked to think aloud in my presence. His remarks could hardly be said to be made to me -- many of them would have been as appropriately addressed to his bedstead -- but none the less, having formed the habit, it had become in some way helpful that I should register and interject.

Nice cocaine reference, John.

Some people see bitterness it Watson's litany here. And John does seem a bit snippy this story. But really, it is more bittersweet, as Watson is acknowledging that their lives have drifted apart. With Watson's practice thriving, and probably married, there's not just as much time in John's life for adventuring.

But it's also a bit of a humble brag, I think. Given the high regard Watson has for the intellect of his friend, to suggest that he was Holmes' muse, even if in a passive way, is no small thing. "I was a whetstone for his mind" doesn't sound like a rebuke to me.

**Holmes:

"I was able, by watching the mind of the child, to form a deduction as to the criminal habits of the very smug and respectable father...A dog reflects the family life. Whoever saw a frisky dog in a gloomy family, or a sad dog in a happy one? Snarling people have snarling dogs, dangerous people have dangerous ones. And their passing moods may reflect the passing moods of others."

Watson is probably right to find it "far-fetched." It is interesting, though, as a reversal of Holmes' prior position on nature vs. nurture. Earlier in his career, Holmes was quick to blame "bad blood" and evil ancestry for a criminal's corruption. But this statement seems much more like suggesting that nurture is as important, if not more so...

**Just as Holmes and Watson have suggested that a woman in "middle age" should no longer be lusty ("Miss Burnet, an Englishwoman of forty or thereabouts...I may add that Miss Burnet's age and character make it certain that my first idea that there might be a love interest in our story is out of the question"), society seems to disapprove of older men being too "active" in romance.

"Then the current of his life was broken. He is sixty-one years of age, but he became engaged to the daughter of Professor Morphy, his colleague in the chair of comparative anatomy. It was not, as I understand, the reasoned courting of an elderly man but rather the more passionate frenzy of youth, for no one could have shown himself a more devoted lover..."

And his family disapproves "We thought it rather excessive."

No passionate frenzy for you, older men!! And women, if your over 40, forget it!! Leave that mushy stuff for the youngsters!!

**Holmes could sometimes appear not to be listening...

...but I fear I weary you." Mr. Bennett spoke in a tone of reproach, for it was very clear that Holmes was not listening. His face was rigid and his eyes gazed abstractedly at the ceiling. With an effort he recovered himself.

Dude, let the man think!

**Bennett's fear-filled description of his beloved mentor acting oddly:

I could see that something was coming along the passage, something dark and crouching. Then suddenly it emerged into the light, and I saw that it was he. He was crawling, Mr. Holmes -- crawling! He was not quite on his hands and knees. I should rather say on his hands and feet, with his face sunk between his hands. Yet he seemed to move with ease. I was so paralyzed by the sight that it was not until he had reached my door that I was able to step forward and ask if I could assist him. His answer was extraordinary. He sprang up, spat out some atrocious word at me, and hurried on past me, and down the staircase.

**Watson, as always, practical:

"Lumbago, possibly. I have known a severe attack make a man walk in just such a way, and nothing would be more trying to the temper."

"Good, Watson! You always keep us flat-footed on the ground.

**Watson continues to be the only practical one, suggesting that Presbury's problems just might be psychological:

"Speaking as a medical man," said I, "it appears to be a case for an alienist. The old gentleman's cerebral processes were disturbed by the love affair. He made a journey abroad in the hope of breaking himself of the passion."

Good old Watson. In a sane world, you would be right...

**Of course, Holmes is also willing to prick the balloon of Watson's practicality:

"His letters and the box may be connected with some other private transaction -- a loan, perhaps, or share certificates, which are in the box."

"And the wolfhound no doubt disapproved of the financial bargain."

**Holmes again being wry:

The door opened and a young lady was shown into the room. As she appeared Mr. Bennett sprang up with a cry and ran forward with his hands out to meet those which she had herself outstretched.

"Edith, dear! Nothing the matter, I hope?"

"I felt I must follow you. Oh, Jack, I have been so dreadfully frightened! It is awful to be there alone."

"Mr. Holmes, this is the young lady I spoke of. This is my fiancee."

"We were gradually coming to that conclusion, were we not, Watson?" Holmes answered with a smile.

**Once again we play the Oxford/Cambridge guessing game. But this time, Doyle is clearly aware of the controversy, and in on the joke. Instead of simply not naming the university, he calls it Camford.

I don't have a horse in this race, so I honestly don't care. It is fun, though, to watch everyone tie themselves into knots trying to make their arguments.

**Watson again seeming a bit exasperated with Holmes, as dropping everything to go off on a case is "an easy effort on the part of Holmes, who had no roots to pull up, but one which involved frantic planning and hurrying on my part, as my practice was by this time not inconsiderable."

Yes, John, we sympathize. Would you rather go back to the days where Holmes bought your practice, paid your rent, and kept your checkbook for you?

**Holmes questions whether Watson can bluff their way through a meeting with Presbury: "Have you the effrontery necessary to put it through?" But Holmes himself seems to lack the nerve, completely changing the planned story in the heat of the moment. Instead of claiming that the professor made the appointment himelf during one of his "spells," Holmes tries to soft pedal it as someone esle might have invited him: "I heard through a second person that Professor Presbury of Camford had need of my services."

**Presbury's overreaction to Holmes' visit is pretty epic:

"Hardly enough, Mr. Holmes!" the old man cried in a high screaming voice, with extraordinary malignancy upon his face. He got between us and the door as he spoke, and he shook his two hands at us with furious passion. "You can hardly get out of it so easily as that." His face was convulsed, and he grinned and gibbered at us in his senseless rage. I am convinced that we should have had to fight our way out of the room if Mr. Bennett had not intervened.

He's ready to beat the crap out of our duo just because of what could be explained as a misunderstanding!

Holmes tries to excuse him, a bit: "Explosive, no doubt, but then from his point of view he has something to explode about if detectives are put on his track and he suspects his own household of doing it." Really, if that's sufficient justification, than life amongst the luxury class in those days must have been much more violent than we thought!

**Another reason is that this mystery is a bit lacking is that Holmes doesn't do all that much detecting. How does he find out about Dorak? Someone else does and hands the information to him: "I have the address of the man in London to whom the professor writes. He seems to have written this morning, and I got it from his blotting-paper. It is an ignoble position for a trusted secretary, but what else can I do?"

He has one of his agents track down Dorak. He waits until Presbury has been nearly killed to take his key and open the mysterious wooden box.

Honestly, most of this story would have played out exactly the same had Holmes not gotten involved!

**As Holmes got older he adopted some agents to carry out menial tasks for him: "Mercer is since your time," said Holmes. "He is my general utility man who looks up routine business."

There could have been some interesting stories about these agents. Who are they? How did they come to work for Holmes?

**"It's surely time that I disappeared into that little farm of my dreams." Soon enough, Sherlock.

**A crazy scene:

In all our adventures I do not know that I have ever seen a more strange sight than this impassive and still dignified figure crouching frog-like upon the ground and goading to a wilder exhibition of passion the maddened hound, which ramped and raged in front of him, by all manner of ingenious and calculated cruelty.

I don't know that monkeys are that interested in tormenting angry dogs. But what do I know? The Granada adaptation adds a line that in Hindu mythology, the dog and the monkey are mortal enemies to try and justify it.

**Macphail the coachman apparently knew a lot of what was going on well ahead of everyone else:

The uproar had brought the sleepy and astonished coachman from his room above the stables. "I'm not surprised," said he, shaking his head. "I've seen him at it before. I knew the dog would get him sooner or later."

Wait a minute!! You're "not surprised"?!??! You knew this all along, and didn't bother to tell anyone?!? Macphail knew that his employer was acting in a crazy fashion, and was tormenting the dog so much that he was jeopardizing his own life...and he keeps this information to himself?!?!?! If he speaks up earlier, perhaps Holmes cracks the case earlier, before anyone is maimed!

Maybe Macphail was the one spreading ugly rumors...

**Mad Czech scientists:

Lowenstein! The name brought back to me the memory of some snippet from a newspaper which spoke of an obscure scientist who was striving in some unknown way for the secret of rejuvenescence and the elixir of life. Lowenstein of Prague! Lowenstein with the wondrous strength-giving serum, tabooed by the profession because he refused to reveal its source.

In modern times, Lowenstein would have an hour-long informercial on late night TV...

**You know, given the revelation that his employer and mentor was injecting himself with monkey testorone (or whatever), Bennett is pretty damn calm: "Well, thanks to you, Mr. Holmes, it is very clear that we have traced the evil to its source."

Really, that's all you have to say? No reaction of shock, or disgust, or outrage? Nothing?!?

**Holmes plan to impede Lowenstein's research:

When I have written to this man and told him that I hold him criminally responsible for the poisons which he circulates, we will have no more trouble.

Well, first of all, it's not at all clear that Lowenstein has violated any laws at all. And just because Holmes will hold him responsible doesn't mean that the law will. And there's no indication whatsoever that Lowenstein would stop his research no matter what Holmes says. Heck, there's not even any indication that Presbury will stop buying the damn stuff and using it!!

I'm just saying, writing a stern letter is not the most satisfying way to resolve a mystery...

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE SUSSEX VAMPIRE!!

The Problem Of Thor Bridge-A Tale Of Two Women

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 13 Sep 2015 12:00:00 +0000

One of the reasons I gave for starting this little blog was that I felt the Sherlock Holmes Canon gave us insight to an entire different time and culture, a look at a different country and class structure and moral framework.

Which brings us to The Problem Of Thor Bridge.

Thor Bridge is a great story, well-written and fascinating, with a cracking good mystery (based on a real crime!). Holmes is at the top of his game, the dialogue sparkles, and Watson is back in charge narratively. By itself, Thor Bridge is a firm rebuttal to those who want to disparage the Case-Book based on a few below-average stories.

But Thor Bridge also serves as--perhaps unintentionally--an examination of the place of women in Victorian society, and how sexism and class rules trapped females into fairly terrifying existences.

Let us start with our victim--and our killer!--hmmm, what's her name again?

That's only half a joke. Imagine my surprise when I searched through the story several times before I realized that Maria Gibson is referred to by name only 3 times in this story. Once her widow refers to her, but by her maiden name, Maria Pinto. Once a police sergeant refers to her as Mrs. Gibson. And her alleged murderer, Grace Dunbar, also calls her Mrs. Gibson once. Every other time--literally every time she's mentioned--it's not by name, but as "Mr. Gibson's wife," or "my wife" or "she" or "that poor woman." Her identity is, essentially, erased in this story--never once is she referred to as Maria Gibson. Even Holmes can only identify her as "a wife, the victim of this tragedy, of whom I know nothing save that she was past her prime..." Though she is the victim in a high-profile murder case, Maria Gibson is reduced to a mere prop, a placeholder, until we're told the true nature of her involvement at the end.

In place of her name, though, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle has everyone in the tale reduce her to an ethnic stereotype. In Thor Bridge, Maria is referred to as "tropical" more often than she is referred to by name. Think about that.

Marlow Bates refers to Maria as "a creature of the tropics, a Brazilian by birth..." He follows by calling her, "Tropical by birth and tropical by nature. A child of the sun and of passion." Her husband said she had a "deep rich nature, too, passionate, whole-hearted, tropical, ill-balanced..." Of course he felt the crime was due to her Latin American origins: "She was crazy with hatred and the heat of the Amazon was always in her blood." And Grace Dunbar felt that Maria "hated me with all the fervour of her tropical nature."

OK, we get it. "Tropical" = hot-headed, emotional, out of control. Those damn Latin Americans get so excitable, they just can't help it.

Of course, all of these staid middle and upper class white folks of the era would think in such terms, as the era was full of ethnic (and other) stereotyping. What's less clear, is whether this is Doyle accurately presenting what the attitudes of the day were, or his projecting his own prejudices into the story.

On one level, we should reject this, if for no other reason than basing a characters behavior on a biased view of "hot-blooded" Latinos is lazy, and robs that character of much of their own agency. Certainly, there are woman of many times and cultures who become obsessive and manic in their love. Why rely on stereotype to explain it?

Then again, having everyone else in the story talk about Maria this way does serve to reinforce the sense of loneliness and isolation she must have felt. Imagine her plight--a bold, attractive American marries her, moves her around three continents, has children with her...and then suddenly decides that he doesn't love her anymore, and he decides he must be "harsh to her, even brutal" in order to "kill her love," because that "would be easier for both of us." And so now Maria is trapped--trapped in a loveless marriage with a total jackass, trapped in a country not her own, and trapped in a society where every single person in her life treats her as a cartoon character, "tropical" and "fiery". And her husband is trying to get the governess to be his new lover! Is it any wonder she went a little bit bonkers?

Even worse, those around her subtly blamed Maria for her marriage's failure. Bates said, "She had loved him as such women can love, but when her own physical charms had faded -- I am told that they once were great -- there was nothing to hold him." See, she got old and less beautiful--it's her fault! Miss Dunbar suggests that Maria was too emotionally immature to hold the love of a great white person: "I would not wish to wrong her, but she loved so vividly in a physical sense that she could hardly understand the mental, and even spiritual, tie which held her husband to me..." See, those damn Brazilians don't understand true love! And the Senator? "It was only when the romance had passed -- and it lingered for years -- that I realized that we had nothing -- absolutely nothing -- in common. My love faded." Hers didn't. Why couldn't she just get over it? And her jealousy? Well, those foreigners couldn't understand a pure, spiritual connection like I have with the hired help:

"There is a soul-jealousy that can be as frantic as any body-jealousy, and though my wife had no cause -- and I think she understood this -- for the latter, she was aware that this English girl exerted an influence upon my mind and my acts that she herself never had."

There were possible solutions, other than tormenting the poor wife, and trying to make her hate you so she'll happier spending the rest of her life with you (WHAT?!?). Yes, England's divorce laws were fairly draconian, but Gibson was "the world's greatest economic force"--surely he could have managed to work some pressure for a favorable interpretation of those laws. Or, since they weren't married in England and weren't British citizens, he could have had them take a trip to wherever the Victorian version of Reno was. From what we're told, Maria probably wouldn't have wanted a divorce. Still, Gibson could have had his wife and children reside at another of the many estates he owned world-wide. Instead, he chose to keep her in his household, abusing her, and forcing her to watch him bond with another woman.

And then we come to our second woman in this tale, Miss Grace Dunbar, the lovely young governess.

We have seen a lot of governesses in the Canon, because in the day, there weren't a lot of other career options available for unmarried middle class women. Typist, teacher, governess...that was about it, if you weren't independently wealthy. And Miss Dunbar didn't seem to have one of those convenient bequests that would allow her independence.

The problem with being an attractive governess, especially if you're a lovely young lady, is that you might be in a bad position if your employer is a predator. You depend on him for your income, you live under his roof...there's no escape.

And let's be clear--the ex-senator was a bit of a cad:

I guess all my life I've been a man that reached out his hand for what he wanted, and I never wanted anything more than the love and possession of that woman. I told her so." "I said to her that if I could marry her I would, but that it was out of my power. I said that money was no object and that all I could do to make her happy and comfortable would be done."

Remember, he told us the Latin Americans were the ones unable to control their passions. Ha!! Also, a proposal that can be broken down to "I will pay you to be my concubine who lives with me and my wife" isn't the type of proposal that most women want to hear, I think.

So what does a young woman do when her incredibly wealthy (and potentially abusive) boss comes on to her? Grace couldn't leave his employment, because "others were dependent upon her, and it was no light matter for her to let them all down by sacrificing her living." Not to mention, if he were vindictive, he could make it very difficult for her to get any other jobs of any valuable.

Holmes quite sensibly remonstrates Gibson: "I do not blame you for feeling (passion for her). I should blame you if you expressed it, since this young lady was in a sense under your protection." That's a fairly enlightened position to take in Victorian times--that men shouldn't abuse their positions of power to undertake romantic relations with their employees.

Perhaps Sherlock does a little bit creepily paternalistic when he chides Gibson, "you have tried to ruin a defenceless girl who was under your roof," and asserts that such harassment might be worse than murder. Heavens, we can't have a girl "ruined," can we? Then again, given the multiple instances Holmes had witnessed of women terrified that their husbands/fiancees would find out that they had had prior dalliances, our detective is justified in worrying about Grace's future might be once Gibson's love "faded" after he had had his way with her. Still, that's another other trap Miss Dunbar faced--if she returned her employer's affections, she would be viewed as tarnished and ruined. Yeesh.

That's not to say that these characters are merely studies in victimology. Neither of these women are exactly candidates for sainthood in how they deal with their problems. While Maria did suffer greatly, I think most of us will agree that nothing can justify killing yourself and framing someone else for the murder so they will suffer. That goes beyond justifiably upset to straight-up crazy.

Meanwhile, Grace was not above using her charms to manipulate things to her advantage. The other reason she didn't quit immediately?

She knew the influence she had over me, and that it was stronger than any other influence in the world. She wanted to use it for good...She believed and said that a fortune for one man that was more than he needed should not be built on ten thousand ruined men who were left without the means of life. That was how she saw it, and I guess she could see past the dollars to something that was more lasting. She found that I listened to what she said, and she believed she was serving the world by influencing my actions. So she stayed.

And Dunbar admits this much to Holmes--"it was only my desire to influence his power to good ends which kept me under his roof." I don't wish to be harsh to Grace here, but "I won't let my rich married boss have sex with me, but I will stay and use his feelings for me to influence his multi-million dollar empire" might not be the most ennobling response she could have had. Then again, it's not as she had a lot of other options...so if she's forced to stay, some good could come from Gibson's besottment.

It should also be noted that Grace was a little bit of a self-justifier: "Nothing could justify me in remaining where I was a cause of unhappiness, and yet it is certain that the unhappiness would have remained even if I had left the house." So, since Maria is going to be miserable anyway, you might as well stay on let Gibson dote on you? Please. That's hardly standing up for the sisterhood.

So, that is our tale of two women. One was a wife, who was trapped in a marriage of unrequited love when her husband suddenly discovered he didn't love her anymore. He was terribly abusive to her, because "make her hate me" seemed like a more practical solution than "divorce" or "separate homes." She was forced, in a foreign country and foreign language, to helpless watch while her husband rejected her but wouldn't release her, and while he preyed on the hired help. The other woman is that hired help, a woman trapped in a society that provided no means of support for her and her family outside of marriage or working for her sexual harasser. Maria and Grace were stuck in situations with no good options, and forced to essentially be in conflict with each other over the affections of a rich man.

I can't say that Doyle intended this story to function as a critique of how women were treated in Victorian England, but it doesn't take a lot of digging to tease out this interpretation. So the next time someone wants to write an article on how superior Victorian times are to modern day, perhaps we can recommend that she read this story, and remind her that back in those "good old days" she might not have had the option of publishing articles under her own name, or of having legal protections against abusive husbands or sexual predator employers.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**For the first time, we have a story titled "Problem." Huzzah!!

I never understood why Doyle so overused "Adventure" in the titles of his story, especially since so many of them were not terribly, well, adventurous. And most of the stories that didn't use the adventure naming convention have titles that work perfectly fine.

After this brief and welcome respite, though, all of our remaining tales are "adventures."

**As a young Marvel Comics fan, I was quite distressed when I read this story and found out that not only did it NOT feature a hammer-wielding Norse god, but there was also not a trace of a magical Asgardian rainbow bridge. What a rip-off!!

**Thor Bridge is a wonderful mystery--and the best part is, it's apparently based on a real case!

Dr. Hans Gross, an Austrian professor of criminology, wrote the Handbook For Criminal Investigators in 1893, and it was translated into English in 1898.

In the book, Gross describes the case of "A.M.," a supposedly wealthy grain merchant who was found apparently murdered by gunshot in the middle of a bridge. His wallet and watch were missing, and it was assume that he had been robbed murdered by a local vagrant, who was arrested. But the "Investigating Officer" noticed "a small, fresh injury" on the wooden parapet of the bridge. He assumed the murderer had thrown something into the water and nicked the bridge; upon dragging the riverbed, they immediately found a large rock tied with 14 feet of rope to a gun with one chamber discharged! Experiments easily recreated the fake/suicide scenario, with nearly identical marks made in the parapet each time. It turned out that A.M. was really in deep financial trouble. He had taken out a large life insurance policy, and staged his suicide to look like a murder so his family would get the benefits. (You can read the full version of the case reprinted in Volume II of The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes.)

Truth is indeed stranger than fiction, eh? Clearly Doyle had read this account, or at least had it described to him in some detail. It is interesting that he changed it from an insurance fraud to a more melodramatic love triangle and attempt to frame someone else for the "murder."

**The sentences that launched a million pastiches:

Somewhere in the vaults of the bank of Cox and Co., at Charing Cross, there is a travel-worn and battered tin dispatch box with my name, John H. Watson, M. D., Late Indian Army, painted upon the lid. It is crammed with papers, nearly all of which are records of cases to illustrate the curious problems which Mr. Sherlock Holmes had at various times to examine.

That particular bank was destroyed during the Blitz. Thus, it became de rigueur for pastiches to preface themselves with tales of somehow finding tin boxes in the attic, or storeroom, or antique shoppe, or handed down by deceased relatives, to justify them as "actually" based on the writings of John Watson.

**Watson describes some of these "lost tales":

Some, and not the least interesting, were complete failures, and as such will hardly bear narrating, since no final explanation is forthcoming. A problem without a solution may interest the student, but can hardly fail to annoy the casual reader.

Uh, this is one reader who disagrees, doctor. We want all the cases, not just the successes!!

**A panoply of apocryphal--albeit failed--cases:

Mr. James Phillimore, who, stepping back into his own house to get his umbrella, was never more seen in this world.

No less remarkable is that of the cutter Alicia, which sailed one spring morning into a small patch of mist from where she never again emerged, nor was anything further ever heard of herself and her crew.

A third case worthy of note is that of Isadora Persano, the well-known journalist and duellist, who was found stark staring mad with a match box in front of him which contained a remarkable worm said to be unknown to science.

Tell me that you don't read that last one and immediately think of Khan's mind-control worms from Star Trek II. KHAAAAAAAAANNNN!!!

**One of John's reasons for suppressing some stories seems to be, well, we must protect the rich:

...the secrets of private families to an extent which would mean consternation in many exalted quarters if it were thought possible that they might find their way into print. I need not say that such a breach of confidence is unthinkable, and that these records will be separated and destroyed now that my friend has time to turn his energies to the matter.

But what if they are "non-exalted" quarters? Is it OK to spoil the secrets of the poor?

Given this standard, it seems most likely means that Senator Gibson has passed on, or at the very least left England...certainly his family would feel "consternation" at the publication of this tale, unless he were no longer around to know of it...

**The reason Watson didn't publish more stories? "I feared to give the public a surfeit which might react upon the reputation of the man whom above all others I revere."

No, no, we wanted more, not less!! More stories could not hurt the reputation of Sherlock Holmes!! More stories, dammit!!

**A lot of the controversy over the last two stories being narrated in the third-person was totally unnecessary, according to Watson: "In some I was myself concerned and can speak as an eye-witness, while in others I was either not present or played so small a part that they could only be told as by a third person."

Funny how so few commentators seem willing to take John at his word there, and come up with increasingly unlikely theories as to who "really" wrote those tales.

**Watson continues to improve with "the method," according to Holmes: "The faculty of deduction is certainly contagious, Watson," he answered. "It has enabled you to probe my secret."

**Our client: "You have heard of Neil Gibson, the Gold King?" he said. "You mean the American Senator?" "Well, he was once Senator for some Western state, but is better known as the greatest gold-mining magnate in the world."

Wait, don't famous ex-senators all run for president, and take high-paying jobs on cable news networks while waiting for their return to power? Different times, I guess.

**Holmes: "The interesting personality of the accused does not obscure the clearness of the evidence."

Wait--interesting how? At this point Holmes knows nothing about Grace Dunbar except that she is the young governess. He certainly doesn't know anything about her personality, other than the fawning letter Gibson sent. How is her personality "interesting," then?

**Really, does this sound like a letter from a man whose wife has just been slain?

I can't see the best woman God ever made go to her death without doing all that is possible to save her...It has been the gossip of the country. And never a voice raised for her! It's the damned injustice of it all that makes me crazy.

It's pretty incredible that a man doesn't once mention his murdered wife in a plea for the detective to help clear the woman accused of murdering her. There's falling out of love with your wife, and then there's not giving a tinker's damned that the mother of your children was murdered in cold blood. What a bastard.

**Fine set-up for a mystery:

The wife was found in the grounds nearly half a mile from the house, late at night, clad in her dinner dress, with a shawl over her shoulders and a revolver bullet through her brain. No weapon was found near her and there was no local clue as to the murder...A revolver with one discharged chamber and a calibre which corresponded with the bullet was found on the floor of her wardrobe...Then the dead woman had a note upon her making an appointment at that very place and signed by the governess.

**Of course, that just points out that there was little ballistics or other forensic science yet. "Same calibre" by itself would get a verdict of not guilty on most episodes of Law & Order. And if you could run ballistics, do fingerprints, check for gunpowder residue, etc., the frame-up would completely fall apart even without Holmes' help.

**Marlow Bates: "a thin, nervous wisp of a man with frightened eyes and a twitching, hesitating manner -- a man whom my own professional eye would judge to be on the brink of an absolute nervous breakdown."

Love those Watson descriptions. And given that Sherlock has twice been forced to rest due to "nervous exhaustion," we can take it that he knows what he's talking about here.

**Bates: "But his wife was his chief victim. He was brutal to her -- yes, sir, brutal! How she came by her death I do not know, but I am sure that he had made her life a misery to her."

Of course, he doesn't specify exactly what that brutality was.

In a later conversation with Gates: "Did you ever witness physical violence towards her?" "No, I cannot say that. But I have heard words which were nearly as bad -- words of cold, cutting contempt, even before the servants."

I don't want to belittle the agony of constantly being verbally and emotionally abused. But even Gibson's biggest critic can't claim that he physically abused her.

Apparently some thought that physical abuse was necessary to justify her murderous scheme--the Granada adaptation has Gates say that Gibson actually struck her more than once.The better for the audience to hate him, and sympathize with her, I suppose.

**More delicous Watson descriptions:

If I were a sculptor and desired to idealize the successful man of affairs, iron of nerve and leathery of conscience, I should choose Mr. Neil Gibson as my model. His tall, gaunt, craggy figure had a suggestion of hunger and rapacity. An Abraham Lincoln keyed to base uses instead of high ones would give some idea of the man. His face might have been chiselled in granite, hard-set, craggy, remorseless, with deep lines upon it, the scars of many a crisis. Cold gray eyes, looking shrewdly out from under bristling brows, surveyed us each in turn.

"An Abraham Lincoln keyed to base uses instead of high ones." My god, that's great stuff, even if you don't agree with Doyle's theories that physical appearance echoes moral character...

**This statement by Holmes has caused some controversy: "My professional charges are upon a fixed scale," said Holmes coldly. "I do not vary them, save when I remit them altogether."

That may or may not be consistent with what we've seen in other stories. Perhaps this is a newer policy, once Holmes' successes have made him financially secure. Or perhaps the "fixed scale" is not per hour or per case, but the clients' wealth..."if you're this rich, I charge this much"?

** Holmes sarcasm to Gibson is breath-taking: "I suppose you are within your rights -- and maybe doing your duty -- in asking such a question, Mr. Holmes." "We will agree to suppose so," said Holmes.

and

This case is quite sufficiently complicated to start with without the further difficulty of false information." "Meaning that I lie." "Well, I was trying to express it as delicately as I could, but if you insist upon the word I will not contradict you."

and

You've done yourself no good this morning, Mr. Holmes, for I have broken stronger men than you. No man ever crossed me and was the better for it." "So many have said so, and yet here I am," said Holmes, smiling.

and

"Very generous, I am sure," said Holmes with a sneer.

Ypu have to love the stories where Holmes take the piss out of the upper class, and this story is problem the detective at his most snide and vicious.

**Holmes admits that, for once, he doesn't actually know everything for certain right away:

Bluff, Watson, bluff! When I considered the passionate, unconventional, unbusinesslike tone of his letter and contrasted it with his self-contained manner and appearance, it was pretty clear that there was some deep emotion which centred upon the accused woman rather than upon the victim.

**More Holmes upbraiding a rich man pretty severely:

"I don't know that anything she is accused of is really worse than what you have yourself admitted, that you have tried to ruin a defenceless girl who was under your roof. Some of you rich men have to be taught that all the world cannot be bribed into condoning your offences."

Nice sentiment, except for the implication that adultery or deflowering a young woman is worse than murder.

**Trouble getting in to see Miss Dunbar in jail: "There was some delay in the official pass,...We were compelled to spend the night at Winchester, as the formalities had not yet been completed..."

Was it really so difficult for someone--especially Sherlock Holmes--to get in to visit an accused person in jail prior to trial? Or was this red tape just a plot device to delay his meeting with Grace, and thus make the story last a little longer?

**Sergeant Coventry:

He was a tall, thin, cadaverous man, with a secretive and mysterious manner which conveyed the idea that he knew or suspected a very great deal more than he dared say. He had a trick, too, of suddenly sinking his voice to a whisper as if he had come upon something of vital importance, though the information was usually commonplace enough.

Seriously, Doyle/Watson was pretty much on fire in this story with the descriptive prose.

Coventry is also a fairly reasonable copper, not afraid at all of having Sherlock make him look bad:

"Anyhow, I'd rather have you than Scotland Yard, Mr. Holmes," said he. "If the Yard gets called into a case, then the local loses all credit for success and may be blamed for failure. Now, you play straight, so I've heard."

Maybe it was just Scotland Yard inspectors who resented Holmes' "interference."

**"And these Americans are readier with pistols than our folk are."

Unfortunately, still true in the 21st century.

**Holmes on why the nature of the crime speaks against the killer making panicky mistakes:

You have planned it. A note has been written. The victim has come. You have your weapon. The crime is done. It has been workmanlike and complete. Do you tell me that after carrying out so crafty a crime you would now ruin your reputation as a criminal by forgetting to fling your weapon into those adjacent reed-beds which would forever cover it, but you must needs carry it carefully home and put it in your own wardrobe, the very first place that would be searched?...Where a crime is cooly premeditated, then the means of covering it are coolly premeditated also.

Of course, just because a killing is coldly planned doesn't mean that, once the blood start flowing, that a first-time criminal might not freak out a little bit and do something stupid. Still, the point is well-taken: the fact that everything else was so well planned makes the suggested "panicked mistake" less likely.

**Grace describing her meeting at the bridge with Maria:

Never did I realize till that moment how this poor creature hated me. She was like a mad woman -- indeed, I think she was a mad woman, subtly mad with the deep power of deception which insane people may have. How else could she have met me with unconcern every day and yet had so raging a hatred of me in her heart?

This is a good example of Dunbar's lack of self-awareness. By her own admission, Dunbar was having a "mental and spiritual" relationship with Maria's husband--can she really be surprised that the woman is upset with her? Does she really believe that most wives would be fine being put on the sidelines emotionally while their husbands bonded "spiritually" with their "work wives"?

Granted, Maria was indeed insane--but Grace shows a stunning lack of empathy and some serious self-deception to claim befuddlement at Maria's anger.

**According to the Granada subtitle, Brazilian women yell and curse...in Spanish:

**Holmes shows the perils of having too good an imagination while spinning theories: "but one drawback of an active mind is that one can always conceive alternative explanations which would make our scent a false one."

Of course, this also applies to various commentators spinning out alternate theories as to what really happened in the various Holmes stories (myself included).

**Holmes defends the police investigation (and his own) against anticipated press attacks, once the truth is known:

The papers may ask why the mere was not dragged in the first instance, but it is easy to be wise after the event, and in any case the expanse of a reed-filled lake is no easy matter to drag unless you have a clear perception of what you are looking for and where.

Of course, believing that they had found the gun right away would have made dragging the mere pointless, so there's really not much for the press to attack--especially since they themselves were enthusiastic supporters of "the gorgeous governess did it" theory!

**"Well, Watson, we have helped a remarkable woman, and also a formidable man. Should they in the future join their forces, as seems not unlikely, the financial world may find that Mr. Neil Gibson has learned something in that schoolroom of sorrow where our earthly lessons are taught."

Given that Watson wrote this story up decades after it happened, he already knows what happened in the future with Gibson and Dunbar. He really should have told us, instead of signing off on a "I wonder what will happen" note. Boo!

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE CREEPING MAN!!

The Adventure Of The Mazarin Stone--Worst. Holmes. Ever.?

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 06 Sep 2015 12:00:00 +0000

There is a tendency--no, more like an obligation--among fans of various shows and genres to rank the objects of their obsessions. It's become even more prevalent during the internet era, when everyone can have a free platform, where we have immediate access to every episode or story, and where expressing your detailed opinion--and having it validated by "likes"--seems to be a major source of self-esteem.

So you don't have to look very far to find people's opinion of what the best episode of Star Trek is, the best James Bond movie, the best season of Buffy.

And because the yin is lonely without the yang, we also get much discussion of what the worst episode/story/season of a creative enterprise is.

Which brings us to The Adventure Of The Mazarin Stone.

Now, I'm not going to use this essay to belabor why I feel that Mazarin Stone is the worst of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes tales. I'll discuss some of my reasoning below.

No, what I'm going to talk about today is what it means for something to be the worst of something good.

So what do we mean? Clearly, even if something is the worst Sherlock Holmes story, we still read it, still analyze it, still collect it. We still love it, in our own way.

I'm on record, for example, arguing that Moonraker is the worst James Bond film. But that doesn't mean that I hate the movie, or I refuse to watch it. It's 007, man! And the worst James Bond movie is more interesting to me than, say, the best Matt Helm movie.

We should, of course, make declarations about how "bad" something is with a measure of humility--every story, no matter how lowly we grade it, is still somebody's first James Bond film, the first Sherlock Holmes story they ever read. Nostalgia and context can have a large impact on someone's critical opinion, and I certainly don't want be seen as deriding something they may love better than I.That's part of the joy of fandom--that every story is loved by someone.

And even the worst episode of most of our favorites has something to recommend it, some bit of dialogue or characterization or background--that adds to our overall understanding and enjoyment of the canon. Yeah, Spock's Brain is horrid...there are still bits of gold you can sift out. So it is with Mazarin Stone--there are some good moments, things that carry you away and make you forget that the story is supposed to be poor, until something comes along and jars you again.

That's the important thing, to a canon-lover. It's not just the obsessive completeness. It's the knowledge that everything plays a part in the whole, even if on its own it might not be very good. It may well be impossible for a series of 60 stories or 179 episodes to be great every time out of the block. But just like family members, we accept these "black sheep" with almost a deeper love, because the "awfullness" makes the better stories stand out. No one can tell you what the worst episode of Full House is, because no one cared enough to keep track (queue the deluge of comments from Full House fans...). But we care, and because we care, we shouldn't ever fully reject the terrible.

So we embrace the "worst." We don't seek to excise it from the canon. We don't throw away our precious VHS copy of Angel One (complete with commercials & trailer!). We don't try to dismiss the "bad" ones as dreams, hoaxes or hallucinations. We don't insist that the terrible run on our favorite comic "didn't really happen." We love the "worst," even when we hate it.

Except...

There is a feeling among certain Sherlock Holmes fans that certain stories should perhaps not be accepted as Canon because of their quality.

Now it's quite possible that I overstate this phenomenon. In addition, the fact that many Holmes commentators are playing "The Grand Game," the gentle fiction that all of Holmes' adventures are real, certainly makes it possibly to interpret a tongue-in-cheek jest as a bit more serious than it really is.

But take one prominent example, the famous pastiche The Seven-Per-Cent Solution, by Nicholas Meyer. In the book's introduction Meyer, writing as Watson, tells us that Mazarin Stone, as well as 3 other stories in Case-Book, are "forged drivel." Now, this is within the context of a pastiche that also tells us that Final Problem and Empty House didn't really happen, so perhaps a grain of salt is needed here. But still, this message seems loud and clear to me: because some stories are of dubious quality, they don't really belong in the Canon.

Others, even including editors of Holmes collections, have opined that some of the stories in Case-Book are not the work of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, because they seem to fit Doyle's "style." And they proceed, without a lick of evidence, to pile up "likely" other authors--his son! His wife! His agent! In other words, they're not good stories, so perhaps they shouldn't count.

Well, I can't agree with that. Are the stories in Case-Book, on average, poorer than those in earlier collections? That's pretty inarguable, I think. But I don't think that we should easily leap to "this story isn't as good as others, so it can't be by Sir Arthur," or "this story is a failure, therefore we shouldn't count it."

I love Doyle's work, but I don't think anyone can seriously argue that it's impossible that, late in his life, Sir Arthur was incapable of putting out a poor story or three, especially as he tried to continue to write a character he thought he had already said goodbye to (twice!). To assume that any drop in quality is automatic evidence that Sir Arthur didn't actually write the stories is too assign him to a pedestal of perfection that I think is unwarranted. And honestly, it is a lit bit immature--"If X is good, it's by my hero; if it's not good, it can't be by him" isn't so much a line of reasoning as an knee-jerk emotional reaction to disappointment.

As we noted above, the bad stories or episodes shouldn't be excised as "forged drivel." They are part and parcel of the whole, and deepen our understanding of the works. The Mazarin Stone, as poor as it may be, is part of the family. You don't deny its authorship or exile it from the Canon--you re-read it each time you work your way through Holmes again, understanding it for what it is--appreciating the good parts, and trying to understand why the less-good parts fail. You don't throw out your errant children...and we shouldn't try to distance ourselves from the occasional artistic misfire.

OTHERS TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**On a housekeeping note, if you were expecting a different story here, sorry. Different editions of the Case-Book have presented the stories in different orders. Why, I couldn't tell you. But for our purposes here, I choose to go with the original publication order, which was also the publication order of the individual stories. I've been chronological throughout the rest of the blog, why stop now?

**Also, the collection has been known alternately as The Case-Book Of Sherlock Holmes, The Case Book Of Sherlock Holmes (no hyphen) and The Casebook Of Sherlock Holmes. Sigh...

For no real reason besides my aesthetic preference, I'll be going with Case-Book.

**The first problem-causing aspect for this story is that it was based upon a play Sir Arthur had written some months earlier, The Crown Diamond. You can read the whole thing here.

I've heard varying (and perhaps contradictory) reports of the play's success--it closed down in London after only a week, it later toured the country for 18 months? Regardless, it is the first Holmes that Doyle had written in some 4 years, and Sir Arthur decided to use it as the basis of a Holmes short story.

The play is dreadfully short (can it have taken more than 20-25 to perform live?), and has only one set, which explains the story's claustrophobic setting. The entire story takes place in the confines of 221B Baker Street, with a parade of people coming and going. All of Holmes investigations take place offstage, and prior to the beginning of the play--perhaps a necessary conceit for the stage--but there's no reason why Doyle couldn't have substantially broadened the mise en scene when he adapted the play to prose form.

As it is, much of Mazarin Stone feels as if it were lazily copied from The Crown Stone, without Doyle bothering to make alterations to make the adaptation more appropriate to a prose story.

**Obviously, this is only the second time that John Watson is not narrating our story--but the second in a row!

I discussed why, in His Last Bow, that I think that led to a weaker story in that case. Well, it's even worse in this case. Watson plays no role whatsoever in the story, and we are robbed of much of his detailed descriptions of characters and scenes.

Observe the fairly prosaic way our narrator describes 221B and Billy, quite unlike the lusher narration we're used to:

He looked round him at the scientific charts upon the wall, the acid-charred bench of chemicals, the violin-case leaning in the the corner, the coal-scuttle, which contained of old the pipes and tobacco. Finally, his eyes came round to the fresh and smiling face of Billy, the young but very wise and tactful page...

And Watson's dialogue in this story? Almost entirely a barrage of single lines designed to draw out exposition, simple, repetitive and almost child-like:

"It all seems very unchanged, Billy.

"Yes, Billy, I know."

"But what is it all about, Billy?"

Watson doesn't even rise to the level of a plot device in this story.

**As I alluded to above, this story has no mystery whatsoever. Holmes has already solved it before the first paragraph, although the reader doesn't so much of a sentence about how Holmes came to suspect the Count, or how he tracked him down. It's like coming into an Agatha Christie story in the final chapter!

The only thing left unknown at the "mystery's" beginning is the location of the Stone itself. And Holmes doesn't used detection or deduction to discover it, but rather a fairly cheap (and unbelievable) parlor trick. Boo!

**In the play, Doyle used Colonel Sebastian Moran as the villain, and used aspects of The Empty House. Fair enough, I suppose, for presenting Holmes in another medium.

For the purposes of adapting the short story, Doyle changed the villain to Count Negretto Sylvius (Great evil name!). But he kept him as a big-game hunter, he kept the false Holmes mannequin, kept the references to airguns. And of course, as readers we already had seen all of this, giving us a distinct deja vu.

Doyle does have Watson explicitly acknowledge this--"we used something of the sort before"--to try and take the sting out of it. But a re-run is still a re-run. And calling attention to an earlier, far better story does no favors to our appreciation of this one.

**There is simply no way to picture the denouement so that it works. I'm sorry, it just can't happen in my mind:

Hallo! What was that?" There was a vague sound which seemed to come from the window. Both men sprang round, but all was quiet. Save for the one strange figure seated in the chair, the room was certainly empty.

"Thank you!" With a single spring Holmes had leaped from the dummy's chair and had grasped the precious jewel. He held it now in one hand, while his other pointed a revolver at the Count's head. The two villains staggered back in utter amazement.

You are not aware that a second door from my bedroom leads behind that curtain. I fancied that you must have heard me when I displaced the figure, but luck was on my side. It gave me a chance of listening to your racy conversation which would have been painfully constrained had you been aware of my presence."

In the stage play, Sherlock had caused the light to black out for a few seconds, which gave him ample time to switch himself with the dummy unobserved.

But that blackout doesn't happen in the short story!! The mannequin is in plain view the entire time!! So even if you grant that Holmes' bedroom suddenly has 2 hidden exits, you still have to believe that the Count and Merton would have their entire conversation with their back turned to the dummy, AND that Sherlock could move the dummy to some other spot and replace it without the movement and noise attracting attention. I'm sorry, without the blackout, I just don't buy it, not in the tiniest, least bit.

**Lord Cantlemere wasn't in the play--he's a creation for the short story.

But he's only vaguely referred early in the play, by Billy: "He's a stiff'un...but I can't stand his Lordship."

That's hardly a strong indictment of him, is it? Particularly coming from a young lad. So at the story's end, when Holmes goes through an elaborate charade to prank Cantlemere, it doesn't feel earned or justified--its just feels cruel. We also don't know who he is--what is his role in the government? Why is he apparently in charge of Holmes investigation?

If Doyle was going to bring in this character, and base the whole post-climax scene on him, he really should have brought Cantlemere into the story earlier, so the audience could loathe him early on, and feel that he deserves Holmes' "perverted" sense of humor.

**Billy: "We had the Prime Minister and the Home Secretary both sitting on that very sofa."

Of course, in the last story, we had the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary coming to Holmes to beg him to help out. So again, this feels like Doyle just riffing on some of Sherlock's greatest hits.

**How, exactly, was the stone stolen? We are given no detail whatsoever. If we are to respect the Count as a master villain, we really need to see some aspect of the crime as particularly daring, or clever, or worthy of Holmes' talents. Instead, we got not one single word regarding the theft itself.

In the regrettable Granada adaptation, the Stone is on display, and the count just hits the commissionaire with his cane, smashes the case, and takes the stone. Hardly the robbery of the century.

**Speaking of the Granada adaptation...well...sigh. it's pretty dire.

Jeremy Brett was ill, and only appeared in a tiny prologue and epilogue that were clearly filmed separately. Holmes was "up north," so the government went to Mycroft to recover the stone.

Fair enough. But the story was so short, it was apparently to difficult to pad out to 51 minutes, so they combined it with The Three Garridebs, in a way that made little sense, and...pshaw, let's just say it's awful and move on, shall we?

**Holmes, referring to the danger of having Billy the page working for him: "That boy is a problem, Watson. How far am I justified in allowing him to be in danger?"

Watson, of course, was often in danger, too. But at least he was an adult.

Of course, anyone Holmes used in his investigations--street urchins, cab drivers, steamer captains, dog owners--could have been just as much in dangers.

And given that just a few minutes later, Holmes instructed Billy to go and taunt and insult a huge boxer, his concern for Billy's welfare was short-lived...

**Despite all my kvetching about the story, there is still some fun dialogue...

"I'm expecting something this evening."

"Expecting what?"

"To be murdered, Watson."

**Holmes seems to have a completely opposite understanding of biology from, say, the real world:

"You have not, I hope, learned to despise my pipe and my lamentable tobacco? It has to take the place of food these days."

"But why not eat?"

"Because the faculties become refined when you starve them. Why, surely, as a doctor, my dear Watson, you must admit that what your digestion gains in the way of blood supply is so much lost to the brain. I am a brain, Watson. The rest of me is a mere appendix. Therefore, it is the brain I must consider."

**Count Negretto Sylvius. Sounds like he could have been a better villain than he turned out: "half-ltalian, you know, and with the Southern graces of manner when in the mood, but a devil incarnate in the other mood. But..Possibly you have heard of his reputation as a shooter of big game."

**Holmes not wanting Watson's help:

"Count me in, Holmes. I have nothing to do for a day or two."

"Your morals don't improve, Watson. You have added fibbing to your other vices. You bear every sign of the busy medical man, with calls on him every hour."

Where's the explanation of these deductions?!? Surely in such a short tale, you could spare three lines to tell us how Sherlock knew Watson had calls on him every hour!

**Padding out a story that should have been over already:

"I've cast my net and I have my fish. But I have not got the stone. What is the use of taking them? We can make the world a better place by laying them by the heels. But that is not what I am out for. It's the stone I want."

Fair enough, I suppose. And we can't blame Holmes for knowing ahead of time that Sylvius would be stupid enough to be carrying the stone on him. Still, if you really do know the whole thing already, the wiser course might be to have them arrested, and then try to sweat the stone's location out of them, perhaps with an offer of a deal. Instead of, say, putting your own life (and Billy's...and Watson's) at risk in an extended interview that on the surface didn't seem any more likely to produce success...

**"The other is Sam Merton the boxer. Not a bad fellow, Sam, but the Count has used him. Sam's not a shark. He is a great big silly bull-headed gudgeon. But he is flopping about in my net all the same."

Sam Merton is a good sounding idea for a character. But he's not really used well. What was his part in the theft? Why would a sophisticate like the Count hook up with a big lug like Merton?

As it is, Sam only exists in the story because Sylvius needs someone to talk to about the stone's location. Otherwise, there is no conversation to overhear!!

Plus, Doyle missed a prime opportunity to remind us of Holmes boxing prowess, and his reputation in the fighting community.

**That bedroom. Holmes damned bedroom. How many exits does that bedroom have?

When Sylvius arrives, Holmes has Watson go for the police, but has him go through another bedroom exit, so he won't encounter the Count: "I think we will go out through the bedroom. This second exit is exceedingly useful."

OK, fine, I suppose--but wait--there is yet another exit: one that leads to behind a curtain next to the mannequin in the window: "You are not aware that a second door from my bedroom leads behind that curtain."

So now my head is spinning. Does Holmes' bedroom have 3 exits? Or are there only two, and the second one somehow leads both out of Baker Street and back into the sitting room?!?! Terribly poor attention to detail.

**We're back to Watson quality verbosity with the description of Count Sylvius: "The famous game-shot, sportsman, and man-about-town was a big, swarthy fellow, with a formidable dark moustache shading a cruel, thin-lipped mouth, and surmounted by a long, curved nose like the beak of an eagle. He was well dressed, but his brilliant necktie, shining pin, and glittering rings were flamboyant in their effect."

**Holmes gets persnickety about criminals treating him with the proper manners:

"Two can play at that game, Holmes."

"It is a small point, Count Sylvius, but perhaps you would kindly give me my prefix when you address me. You can understand that, with my routine of work, I should find myself on familiar terms with half the rogues' gallery, and you will agree that exceptions are invidious."

Geez. Good thing he didn't call you Sherlock...

**Apocryphal case: "Old Baron Dowson said the night before he was hanged that in my case what the law had gained the stage had lost."

**Another fine exchange on why Holmes chases criminals (even if it furthers the "borrowed wholesale from Colonel Moran" problem):

"Come now, Count. You used to shoot lions in Algeria."

"Well?"

"But why?"

"Why? The sport -- the excitement -- the danger!" "And, no doubt, to free the country from a pest?"

"Exactly!" "My reasons in a nutshell!

**Holmes getting scary: "You can't bluff me, Count Sylvius." Holmes's eyes, as he gazed at him, contracted and lightened until they were like two menacing points of steel. "You are absolute plate-glass. I see to the very back of your mind."

**Holmes has at least done his homework of the Count:

"Do you know what I keep in this book?..."It's all here, Count. The real facts as to the death of old Mrs. Harold, who left you the Blymer estate, which you so rapidly gambled away."

"You are dreaming!"

"And the complete life history of Miss Minnie Warrender."

"Tut! You will make nothing of that!"

"Plenty more here, Count. Here is the robbery in the train de-luxe to the Riviera on February 13, 1892. Here is the forged check in the same year on the Credit Lyonnais."

Of course, all of that is completely irrelevant to the case at hand. If he could have been prosecuted for any of these misdeeds, he likely would have been already. So, aside from trying to convince us what an evil badass Sylvius is, how does this help Holmes solve the case, or force the Count to confess? It doesn't.

Holmes is far bolder and more accusatory in the original play, outright saying that Moran had committed murders and robberies. Still, it is to the same effect--no impact on the story at all.

**How Holmes can prove Sylvius is guilty" "I have the cabman who took you to Whitehall and the cabman who brought you away. I have the commissionaire who saw you near the case. I have Ikey Sanders, who refused to cut it up for you. Ikey has peached, and the game is up."

Again, with no details, we can't tell if this is brilliant detection on Holmes' part, or if the Count is just a really, really terrible crook, leaving at least 3 witnesses to his crime and doing a lousy job of disposing of his booty.

**For once, at least, Holmes is deferring to the authorities, and not his own personal sense of justice. Despite his obvious distaste for the Count, Sherlock is willing to let him escape in exchange for fulfilling his mission: "We don't want you or Sam. We want the stone. Give that up, and so far as I am concerned you can go free so long as you behave yourself in the future. If you make another slip well, it will be the last. But this time my commission is to get the stone, not you."

**Funny:

"Billy, you will see a large and ugly gentleman outside the front door. Ask him to come up."

"If he won't come, sir?"

"No violence, Billy. Don't be rough with him.

Haha he's sending a child to confront a dangerous crook!!

**More droll dialogue:

"You won't die in your bed, Holmes."

"I have often had the same idea. Does it matter very much? After all, Count, your own exit is more likely to be perpendicular than horizontal.

Ooooohhh...

**I complained about Sam's characterization earlier, so in fairness I must praise this small bit: Holmes's debonair manner was a new experience, and though he vaguely felt that it was hostile, he did not know how to counter it.

**Holmes leaving the villains alone to talk it over:

I'm going into that bedroom. Pray make yourselves quite at home in my absence. You can explain to your friend how the matter lies without the restraint of my presence. I shall try over the Hoffman 'Barcarole' upon my violin. In five minutes I shall return for your final answer.

Merton and Sylvius didn't know the police had already been sent for. Why not flee? Holmes got lucky here.

**Ah, modern technology:

"I suppose he's not listening?"

"How can he be listening with that music going?"

Really, these are master criminals?

**Sam, on why they can't flee the country yet: "But the false bottom ain't ready." Uh, false bottom to what? The line in the play is "The false bottom ain't in the hat-box yet."

**Master criminals at work again:

"Here is the stone."

"I wonder you dare carry it."

"Where could I have it safer? If we could take it out of Whitehall someone else could surely take it out of my lodgings."

Wow, it's hard to imagine these clowns stealing candy, let alone swiping a crown jewel...

**At the end, we're back to brief, unremarkable narration, and a fairly abrupt finish: There was an inrush of police, the handcuffs clicked and the criminals were led to the waiting cab. Watson lingered with Holmes, congratulating him upon this fresh leaf added to his laurels.

**And again, the whole Lord Cantlemere bit is anti-climactic and overlong. Without properly setting up the noble as a boor, makes Holmes look a bit like a jackass.

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE PROBLEM OF THOR BRIDGE!

His Last Bow--On His Majesty's Secret Service!!

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sat, 22 Aug 2015 12:00:00 +0000

We've covered 4 novels and 43 short stories of Sherlock Holmes solving mysteries and dispensing justice.

Which brings us to His Last Bow.

His Last Bow is a tale that I've always found a tiny bit frustrating. Neither fish nor fowl, it tries to straddle two genres, and put our hero in an unfamiliar situation for his final coup de grace.

Because His Last Bow is most certainly not a standard mystery--it is a spy thriller, an espionage tale, a story not of Sherlock Holmes fighting crime, but of his protecting England from spies on the eve of The Great War.

Not that there aren't often many similarities between spy stories and mysteries. Indeed, espionage tales often involve a mystery--who is the spy? Who is the traitor? How is the information getting passed to the enemy?

But there can be just as many differences between a spy story and a crime thriller as there are congruities. We have to overgeneralize, of course, because there are as many sub-genres of spy story as there are for mysteries.

But allow me to explore a couple of ways we can expect spy stories to differ from mysteries, and whether Sir Arthur Conan Doyle does a good job of positioning Holmes within that milieu.

First, while many espionage tales do not include a mystery. Whodunnit of howdunnit is often less important than stop them from doing it again, or finding a way to lessen or even reverse the impact of the nasty business.

We have seen Sherlock in mysteries involving espionage and the theft of government secrets three times before Last Bow--The Naval Treaty, The Second Stain, and The Bruce-Partington Plans. But in each of those cases, Holmes was involved only in the the mystery side of things--find the papers, and find who stole them. He wasn't involved in the deeper matters of mitigating the impact of their thefts, or penetrating enemy organizations.

But in His Last Bow, there is no mystery. We already know who the spy is, we know what he is doing and whom he is working for. Hell, the first half of the tale is spent with the spy and his master telling us everything!! (Although I must confess, when I first read this story, I suspected that Von Bork was really Holmes in disguise. So young, but so stupid...). The only mystery at all is the reader wondering where the hell was Sherlock Holmes in this story!!

The second difference between many spy and mystery stories is the stakes. Not to suggest that murder and blackmail and the like are trivial. But espionage tales generally eschew the individual level tragedies and are focused on the national or global threats. We have to maintain the balance of power! We have to safeguard our country!! At their most absurd level, of course, we have to save the globe from a monomaniacal billionaire who wants to kill everyone. Mysteries? The hero just wants to catch the crook, and perhaps stop him from murdering or stealing again. Important stuff, to be sure, but without the geopolitical implications that characterize many a spy thriller.

And that is the case with His Last Bow. Holmes is not acting at the behest of some mere client, but the Foreign Minister and Prime Minister of Great Britain! Sherlock is not out to catch some predator--as far as we know Von Bork has never hurt a fly--but to prevent England from being at a massive disadvantage in the forthcoming war! Rather than saving a life or two or rescuing a damsel or recovering some bank's fortune, Holmes is trying to save thousands of lives, potentially!! Higher stakes, indeed!!

So His Last Bow is very much in the spy mold, and not the standard Sherlockian mode. But does that make for as satisfying a tale?

Not only is there no mystery in this story, but there is precious little use of Holmes' brilliant, deductive mind. Consider that when he detected a "deep organising power" behind much of the crime in London, Holmes used his powers discover that his foe was Professor Moriarty. In this story, however, there was no flight of brilliance--Holmes went deep undercover, until he "caught the eye of a subordinate agent of Von Bork." In other words, instead of tracking down the master spy himself, he made himself an attractive tool and waited for the villain to come to him. I don't want to denigrate that--it took two years of hard work, and not breaking character, and heaven knows what other hardships. But people don't read a Sherlock Holmes story expecting Donnie Brasco, and it is a little bit jarring.

Furthermore, the format of the short story is perhaps too constraining for this type of tale. Holmes' undercover work here obviously parallels that of Birdie Edwards, the Pinkerton who infiltrated the Molly Maguires in Valley Of Fear. But Birdie's story was given 7 chapters in a full novel.

Yes, I did criticize that approach for being too great of a a digression. But that was mainly because a) it didn't involve Holmes at all, and b) so much detail really wasn't necessary for explaining a mystery that was already solved. But Doyle over-corrected here to the other extreme. Holmes' entire two years undercover is covered in half of one paragraph! Perhaps we didn't need seven chapters, but this is the hero of the Canon, and we wanted much, much more detail here, especially as in this case it wouldn't be distracting us from the main story--it was the main story!! This is too much like The Final Problem, where all of Holmes' investigation has been done "off-screen," before the reader ever got there, lessening our involvement in the stakes of the hunt. And Von Bork is no Moriarty, so we don't have the satisfaction of that clash of brilliant minds to distract us from the sketchiness of the plot.

Also jarring is the narrative style--His Last Bow is the first Holmes tale not to be narrated by John Watson (excluding, of course, the historical digressions in Study In Scarlet and Valley Of Fear). That's not to say that it is bad--the story is well written, the characterizations of our villains well done and interesting. But for me, one of the best things about the Canon is Watson, his personality and perceptions. In His Last Bow, he has at best a glorified cameo, and an oft-quoted Holmes phrase about him does little to ease our unrest at his absence. And given that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle seemed to plan this to be, once again, the last Sherlock Holmes story, it is off-putting to have to experience it with so little of Sherlock's own Boswell.

So while His Last Bow does make the necessary moves to position itself as more of a spy story than a mystery, it does so at the expense of making it a less good Holmes and (especially) Watson story. The experimentation by Sir Arthur is welcome, and contemporary world events perhaps justified changing Holmes' focus. And it is a very engaging read. But His Last Bow is not done as well as other Holmes' "espionage" cases, and it is done in a manner to deny us what we want most in what many must have thought must be the last Sherlock story--our heroes being celebrated for what caused us to love them in the first point, rather than being virtual guest stars in Van Bork's schemes.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**Meanwhile, there is a great deal of controversy over the quality of Holmes' tradecraft in this story. Should Holmes have revealed his identity to Von Bork, and revealed that much of "secrets" he had been passing on were misinformation? Should Holmes have let Von Bork leave, and keep up the relationship, so "Altamont" could continue passing bad information? What should have been done with Von Bork? Some even seem confused as to whether or not Von Bork was actually arrested or not.

Part of the confusion lies in Doyle's writing of the scene, which leaves things purposely vague. He is the sum total of what we're told about Von Bork's fate:

No, Mr. Von Bork, you will go with us in a quiet, sensible fashion to Scotland Yard, whence you can send for your friend, Baron Von Herling, and see if even now you may not fill that place which he has reserved for you in the ambassadorial suite.

We should remember that, perhaps emboldened by suddenly being able to be himself after 2 years, Holmes was being particularly ebullient and pawky with his prisoner. Can anyone seriously think that by this taunt Holmes actually meant that, after a night at Scotland Yard, Von Bork would be released to go visit his diplomatic master? He's teasing and tormenting his prisoner, not predicting his future.

The second thing to remember is that, in this tale, Holmes is most certainly not a "private actor." This isn't a case where the police dismissed his help, or where Holmes could dispense private justice with a deserving criminal. Holmes was quite clearly working for the Crown, and against a foe who was trying to undermine his country. Decisions about what to do with Von Bork, and when to bring him in, were surely "above his pay grade." He was no doubt acting under instruction--perhaps even from Mycroft, who was surely involved in such dealings, given how deeply he was involved in security matters in the Bruce-Partington affair. If Holmes "blew his cover" and brought in Von Bork "too early," it was surely at the direction of someone higher-up.

Why? Let's look at what we do know, and what many have overlooked. While Von Bork was expected to drop off his signal book the next day, Von Herling suggested that, "So far as I can judge the trend of events, you will probably be back in Berlin within the week." That means Von Bork wasn't thought to hopping the fastest route home--especially given the events of the next few days, travel could be tricky for a German national. If he fell out of contact for a day or two, or was late, it wouldn't be that remarkable, given the chaos about to grip the continent.

And what about Von Bork's family? "[M]y wife and the household left yesterday for Flushing..." And our narrator tells us "for his family and household had been a large one. It was a relief to him, however, to think that they were all in safety."

But he never actually knows that they are safe, does he? And given that Holmes knew the truth of Von Bork's activities, so did the British government. How likely was it, then, that they would allow a master spy's family to leave for home? Wouldn't you detain them, and hold them as leverage against a dangerous enemy? Search them, and find the "less important" but nonetheless incriminating materials she was carrying?

It might be playing dirty, but this was a time of (incipient) war. Mightn't the authorities charge Von Bork's wife with espionage, and threaten to imprison her for life unless Von Bork himself agreed to turn double agent? That would be reason enough to reveal the truth about Altamont to him--Von Bork's night in Scotland Yard would be spent with counter-espionage people blackmailing him to work for them now, cutting "Altamont" out as the middle-man. And that would be more effective if Von Bork already knew how miserably he had failed.

I can picture Mycroft laying out the very logical case to the prisoner: "You care deeply about your family, you'd hate to have them come to harm. Well, if word got out how badly you've been gulled, I think you and your family can bid adieu to the triumphant reception you were expecting home in Germany. Disgrace, or worse, will be your fate. Even more, we have your wife on espionage charges, with a 100% chance of conviction and a lengthy prison stay. Yet all of that could be easily avoided, if you agree to keep passing on bad information to your masters--and perhaps send us some sensitive information form your side. Really, it seems to be the only way to protect your family and keep your reputation and freedom."

That sales pitch is stronger if Von Bork knows the whole truth, and if he agrees to turn, there is no more need for Altamont. Holmes' revealing himself was a feature of the plan, not a bug.

**Who is the "author," the narrator of our story?

For the first time in the Canon, it is not explicitly John H. Watson, M.D.

Well, I think it still is. But why hide the fact? Why tell the story in third-person?

Well, 75% of the tale occurs outside of Watson's presence. If he maintained his previous style, telling us only what he had personally witnessed, this would be a very short story indeed.

Another factor to consider is that this story was released in wartime, more than a year before the war's end. Perhaps Watson, returning to service for the war, was occupying some sensitive position, and therefore wished to deemphasize his role in the events of this story.

Or, perhaps, someone saw the propaganda value in the tale, and wrote it up without Watson's permission?

[Realistically, of course, if Watson is narrating the tale from the beginning, the "surprise" of Holmes' revealing himself is totally spoiled, so Doyle felt it necessary to mix things up a bit.]

Still, much of the descriptive writing bears the marks of Watson's prose, evocative and very English:

It was nine o'clock at night upon the second of August--the most terrible August in the history of the world. One might have thought already that God's curse hung heavy over a degenerate world, for there was an awesome hush and a feeling of vague expectancy in the sultry and stagnant air. The sun had long set, but one blood-red gash like an open wound lay low in the distant west.

And

They stood with their heads close together, talking in low, confidential tones. From below the two glowing ends of their cigars might have been the smouldering eyes of some malignant fiend looking down in the darkness.

Delicious stuff!

**This was a patriotic story released in a time of war, and clearly marketed as such:

I think the desire to boost public morale, to belittle the enemy, and yet protect classified secrets from the affair, are all the explanation we need to elide over some of the more dubious and less clear points.

**For example, yes, Von Bork is made to look like an idiot. He's arrogant and dismissive, and he looks like an amateur when Holmes takes him down. And of course, his cocky derision of the English comes back to bite him in the arse: Von Bork laughed. "They are not very hard to deceive," he remarked. "A more docile, simple folk could not be imagined."

But, Von Bork is given a lot of crap from commentators for showing his safe to Altamont, and sharing the combination.

Well, not to argue against the herd, but let's remember that Von Bork was leaving the next day, and would presumably never be back again. Who cares who knew the combination? The safe was going to be empty!!

Plus, most people overlook the fact that you needed more than a mere combination to open the safe--you needed a key, as well: "Von Bork detached a small key from his watch chain, and after some considerable manipulation of the lock he swung open the heavy door."

As to getting fooled by Holmes, well, let's not cast aspersions on Holmes skills. Watson lived with the dude, and never recognized him in disguise. After 2 years undercover, without once breaking character, "Altamont" would have convinced almost anyone. On their last day together, Von Bork let his guard slip. As Holmes said, "it is better than to fall before some ignoble foe." Don't diminish Holmes' achievement by casting Von Bork as overly dull.

**Baron Von Herling described: "He was a huge man, the secretary, deep, broad, and tall, with a slow, heavy fashion of speech which had been his main asset in his political career."

A "slow, heavy fashion of speech" is a political asset? In Germany, I guess...?

**Shades of the Second Stain: Von Herling passed on something he overheard at a cabinet minster's social gathering, and "Unfortunately our good chancellor is a little heavy- handed in these matters, and he transmitted a remark which showed that he was aware of what had been said."

So, this is a second case where an indiscreet upper official caused problems. And in Second Stain, most observers think that the indiscreet potentate was Kaiser Wilhelm.

Kaisers and chancellors...always making life difficult for diplomats and spies!

**Von Herling believes that Von Bork's cover is so perfect, that the British never suspect because, "You yacht against them, you hunt with them, you play polo, you match them in every game..." So athletes are the best spies?!?

**Despite obvious propaganda going on here, it is important to note that Doyle presents the Germans cynical and manipulative, but not out-and-out evil. "We live in a utilitarian age. Honour is a mediaeval conception," says Von Herling.

Doyle clearly gives the Germans the blame for starting the war. But he also doesn't portray as inhuman monsters, but as worthy opponents. And he also shows the British playing some of the same games.

**Von Herling also says that Germany tried pretty hard to keep England out of the war, by stirring up internal problems: "We have stirred he up such a devil's brew of Irish civil war, window-breaking Furies, and God knows what to keep her thoughts at home."

So, women's suffrage: a German plot. Try running that by your female friends!

**Who hates Britain most of all? "I assure you that our most pan- Germanic Junker is a sucking dove in his feelings towards England as compared with a real bitter Irish-American." Certainly at that time, Von Bork may well have been right...

**Von Herling and Von Bork debating the use of paid underlings:

"Five hundred pounds for this particular job. Of course he has a salary as well."

"The greedy rouge. They are useful, these traitors, but I grudge them their blood money."

"I grudge Altamont nothing. He is a wonderful worker. If I pay him well, at least he delivers the goods, to use his own phrase."

Hatred and politics are a wonderful motivator, but money usually seems needed in these cases to clinch the deal...

**That does raise the question, though...what did Altamont do? Did he have a job? How did a bitterly anti-English Irish-American supposedly get access to all those deep English secrets?

**Oh, Sir Arthur, tell us how you really feel about Americans? "If you heard him talk you would not doubt it. Sometimes I assure you I can hardly understand him. He seems to have declared war on the King's English as well as on the English king."

At least we don't say "maths."

**"That is Martha, the only servant I have left." The secretary chuckled. "She might almost personify Britannia..."

You're more right than you know, Von Bork.

As for those who suggest that Martha is Mrs. Hudson, please. The universe is not that closed...there are many woman in England who would help Sherlock Holmes in a patriotic effort, and for him to use someone who had a known personal attachment to Sherlock Holmes risked discovery. Besides, it's not likely that neither Watson nor Mrs. Hudson would acknowledge the other when meeting again after so long.

** "I'm bringing home the bacon at last." OK, maybe Von Bork was right about Altamont's war on the King's English.

Seriously, though, Sherlock's contemporary Americanisms are pretty good...

**It's too bad no one has adapted this story to TV or film: "and a small goatee beard which gave him a general resemblance to the caricatures of Uncle Sam." Oh, man, I would pay to see that!

**How long have the Germans been planning this?

"Well, I chose August for the word, and 1914 for the figures, and here we are." The American's face showed his surprise and admiration. "My, but that was smart! You had it down to a fine thing." "Yes, a few of us even then could have guessed the date.

Well, that was certainly prescient, considering he got the safe four years ago!

Of course, short of Asimov's psycho-history, it's impossible to believe that Germany could have micro-managed events--both with allies and enemies--to such an extent that Von Bork could have predicted to the very month when hostilities would break out.

Unless, of course, you choose to believe that Germany was actually behind the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand...

**Citizenships are no protection when one is charged with espionage: "Well, so was Jack James an American citizen, but he's doing time in Portland all the same. It cuts no ice with a British copper to tell him you're an American citizen. 'It's British law and order over here,' says he."

**He sat down at the table and scribbled a check, which he tore from the book,

Wait wait wait wait.

Von Bork paid his agents...with checks?!?!?!?

Jesus, maybe he was a pretty stupid spy!

**The reveal: "Only for one instant did the master spy glare at this strangely irrelevant inscription. The next he was gripped at the back of his neck by a grasp of iron, and a chloroformed sponge was held in front of his writhing face."

**Our heroes reunited: "Another glass, Watson!" said Mr. Sherlock Holmes as he extended the bottle of Imperial Tokay. The thickset chauffeur, who had seated himself by the table, pushed forward his glass with some eagerness.

**More evidence that Holmes was winding Von Bork up. When the spy is still unconscious, Holmes tells Watson, "I may say that a good many of these papers have come through me, and I need not add are thoroughly untrustworthy."

That "thoroughly" vanishes, though, when Von Bork wakes up, and Holmes is using understatement to let Von Bork realize the depth of his predicament: "It is certainly a little untrustworthy," said Holmes...
"Your admiral may find the new guns rather larger than he expects, and the cruisers perhaps a trifle faster."

**Oh, it is good to see these two together again:

How have the years used you? You look the same blithe boy as ever."

"I feel twenty years younger, Holmes. I have seldom felt so happy as when I got your wire asking me to meet you at Harwich with the car. But you, Holmes--you have changed very little-- save for that horrible goatee."

Pawky, Watson, pawky!!

"These are the sacrifices one makes for one's country, Watson," said Holmes, pulling at his little tuft. "To-morrow it will be but a dreadful memory."

**Holmes is very proud of his bee book:

Here is the fruit of my leisured ease, the magnum opus of my latter years!" He picked up the volume from the table and read out the whole title, Practical Handbook of Bee Culture, with Some Observations upon the Segregation of the Queen. "Alone I did it. Behold the fruit of pensive nights and laborious days when I watched the little working gangs as once I watched the criminal world of London.

**The very (very) brief summation of Holmes' time undercover:

When I say that I started my pilgrimage at Chicago, graduated in an Irish secret society at Buffalo, gave serious trouble to the constabulary at Skibbareen, and so eventually caught the eye of a subordinate agent of Von Bork, who recommended me as a likely man, you will realize that the matter was complex. Since then I have been honoured by his confidence, which has not prevented most of his plans going subtly wrong and five of his best agents being in prison. I watched them, Watson, and I picked them as they ripened.

Again, that took 7 chapters in Valley Of Fear. Perhaps there is a happy medium somewhere between the two?

**Holmes: "Though unmusical, German is the most expressive of all languages,"

**Apocryphal case: "It was I also who saved from murder, by the Nihilist Klopman, Count Von und Zu Grafenstein, who was your mother's elder brother."

**An unlikely assessment from Holmes:

But you have one quality which is very rare in a German, Mr. Von Bork: you are a sportsman and you will bear me no ill-will when you realize that you, who have outwitted so many other people, have at last been outwitted yourself.

Somehow, I doubt that will be Von Bork's attitude...

**A telling discussion of civil liberties and wartime:

"I suppose you realize, Mr. Sherlock Holmes," said he, "that if your government bears you out in this treatment it becomes an act of war...You are a private individual. You have no warrant for my arrest. The whole proceeding is absolutely illegal and outrageous."

"The Englishman is a patient creature, but at present his temper is a little inflamed, and it would be as well not to try him too far."

While Von Bork is a bit blustery here--certainly detaining an enemy agent who has admitted espionage is not an act of war, and Holmes is working for His majesty's government, so he is no private individual here--he does raise some important points.

I won't pretend to know the legalities of 1914 British law on detaining suspected criminals, assault, and the such. I would suppose that Holmes' position as proto-MI5 might give sufficient leeway to capture the spy.

But Holmes' reply--the English are a bit pissed at foreigners right now, so you'd be better off not crying "oh my rights" right now--sounds a little bit too much like the ad hoc justifications that lead us to Guantanamo and other abuses. Rights shouldn't be determined by popularity, or public temperament...

**Saddest line in the Canon? "Stand with me here upon the terrace, for it may be the last quiet talk that we shall ever have."

**Classic:

"There's an east wind coming, Watson."

"I think not, Holmes. It is very warm."

"Good old Watson! You are the one fixed point in a changing age.

**Sadly, these words, while well-intentioned, were destined to be very, very wrong:

There's an east wind coming all the same, such a wind as never blew on England yet. It will be cold and bitter, Watson, and a good many of us may wither before its blast. But it's God's own wind none the less, and a cleaner, better, stronger land will lie in the sunshine when the storm has cleared.

That's what believing in a divine hand in the affairs of man gets you--a belief that everything, no matter how awful, must really be for the best. Phooey.

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE MAZARIN STONE!

The Adventure Of The Devil's Foot--Holmes And Watson Totally Get Wasted!!

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 16 Aug 2015 12:00:00 +0000

For forty-some stories I've managed to preface my trivial detail-obsessed wallow in each Sherlock Holmes story with a longer essay, focusing on some aspect of the mystery I felt particularly fascinating.

Which brings us to The Adventure of The Devil's Foot.

Because I got nothing.

Not that there isn't a lot of interesting things going on in Devil's Foot. There certainly are. It's a great story.

But most of most fascinating ideas in the tale are reprises of issues I've already talked about in earlier essays, as this story returns to a lot of themes from earlier Holmes stories. And I don't want to repeat myself too much. Yet what's left, as curious and informative as it may be, doesn't justify a longer piece.

So forgive me, dear reader, for no huge and overlong analysis this time. Let's just get straight to the...

OTHERS TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**We have discussed, most extensively in Abbey Grange, how problematic it is when Sherlock Holmes takes it into his own hands to determine if criminals--even killers--deserve punishment.

So while I won't belabor my conclusions again (spoiler alert: it's very problematic), Devil's Foot provides a couple of unique aspects we should acknowledge.

First of all, Dr. Leon Sterndale, unlike the others Holmes allowed to go unpunished, committed deliberate, premeditated murder. This was not arguably self-defense, or the unfortunate result of a fight, or a crime committed "in the heat of passion." Sterndale, like the big game hunter he is, stalked and killer Mortimer Tregennis, and executed him in cold blood. And in a particularly heinous way: "Then you passed out and closed the window, standing on the lawn outside smoking a cigar and watching what occurred."

You can argue whether he was justified (Holmes: "I have never loved, Watson, but if I did and if the woman I loved had met such an end, I might act even as our lawless lion- hunter has done. Who knows?"). You can argue that the case might have proven impossible to prove before a jury--that was Sterndale's excuse for executing Tregennis in the first place! But given Sterndale's propensity for violence and attitude towards civilized justice--"'I have lived so long among savages and beyond the law,' said he, 'that I have got into the way of being a law to myself,'" and "I have come at last to be a law to myself."--we cannot have any confidence in Holmes' standby of "he is unlikely to commit another crime, so..." No, even a an "exile" in Africa, it seems not unlikely that Sterndale will take justice into his own hands again.

Let us also remember that Sterndale had absolutely no proof--none whatsoever--that Mortimer Tregennis murdered Brenda. Holmes wouldn't share any of the investigation's facts with the great hunter. So Sterndale merely presumed that Mortimer had stolen some Devil's Foot--even though he had no idea when or how. He assumed Mortimer had sufficient motive. He threatened and tortured Mortimer, yet Tregennis did not confess--Sterndale only says, "The wretch sank into a chair, paralyzed at the sight of my revolver." Surely, in his self-justifying confession, he would have told Holmes if Tregennis had admitted to the deed. [The 1965 BBC adaptation does have Tregennis confess, albeit at gunpoint].

I think that a case--admittedly shaky--can be made that Holmes overreached on some of his conclusions, and perhaps Mortimer Tregennis was not guilty. With none of the facts at his disposal, there is no way the Leon Sterndale could have been been certain of Tregennis' guilt. It's certainly possible that he tortured and killed an innocent man, which is the danger of taking the law into your own hands.

But most damning of all--why was Dr. Sterndale still carrying the poison with him when he came in response to Holmes' summons at the end? It was two days after Mortimer's death...surely carrying that packet on his person could only lead to his conviction if was somehow searched, giving the police the only clue they might need to convict him. Why the hell risk it--unless he planned to use it to kill again?

Remember, Holmes had summoned Sterndale after the murder of Mortimer, and Sterndale had to be suspicious as to why. Did the detective suspect him? Twice Watson has the hunter look surprised, if not annoyed, at having to meet with them outside, and not in their dwelling: "He turned in some surprise towards the rustic arbour in which we sat....'You will excuse this informal reception in the open air...'" And Sterndale was carrying the Devil's Foot with him, when that would be foolishly reckless--unless he intended to use it again.

It is all implication (or an overly eager misreading on my part). But I believe that when Holmes summoned Sterndale, he feared that the detective had sussed him out. And he brought some radix pedis diaboli with him to the cottage, planning to kill Holmes (or drive him insane)--with Watson as collateral damage. Just another victim of the "Cornish horror," which the pedestrian local police would never solve. But his plan was thwarted when Holmes insisted on taking the meeting outside.

And that is why Leon Sterndale should not have been allowed to escape untouched by the law.

**Devil's Foot also reprises a theme I cover at great length in my essay on The Hound Of The Baskervilles: a rejection of the supernatural in favor of reason and intellect.

Holmes strength--his mind, his deductions--are worthless in the milieu of ghost and demons. And, as in Hound, he declares as much several times:

"It is not of this world. Something has come into that room which has dashed the light of reason from their minds. What human contrivance could do that?"

"I fear," said Holmes, "that if the matter is beyond humanity it is certainly beyond me. Yet we must exhaust all natural explanations before we fall back upon such a theory as this.

And

I take it, in the first place, that neither of us is prepared to admit diabolical intrusions into the affairs of men. Let us begin by ruling that entirely out of our minds.

I won't go on to much about this, as I covered it pretty well back in Hound. But I will reiterate that Holmes and Watson should treat the supernatural like a Scooby-Doo episode: something to be debunked, not embraced. And if you're doing a pastiche where Sherlock is interacting with actual supernatural forces, I don't think I agree with your understanding of the character.

**This is the second time that Holmes' nervous exhaustion has led to an enforced exile from London: "Holmes's iron constitution showed some symptoms of giving way in the face of constant hard work of a most exacting kind...but he was induced at last, on the threat of being permanently disqualified from work, to give himself a complete change of scene and air."

Of course, both times a case dropped into his lap, and Sherlock certainly showed no signs of the stress of working threatening his health. To the contrary, getting his mind engaged on singular problems seems to have been the best medicine, not an enforced rest that would let his mind go unused and sink into the depths of depression again...

**Of course, Watson says that Holmes' condition was "aggravated, perhaps, by occasional indiscretions of his own."

A cocaine use reference? Or some other "indiscretions?" Stop being so damned discreet, Watson!!

**Watson claiming that Holmes' "aversion to publicity" made it difficult to get the detective to allow his cases to be published:

To his sombre and cynical spirit all popular applause was always abhorrent, and nothing amused him more at the end of a successful case than to hand over the actual exposure to some orthodox official, and to listen with a mocking smile to the general chorus of misplaced congratulation.

Of course, that's quite a contrast with Holmes' penchant for sometimes ridiculous dramatic flourishes in the resolution of his cases. Stolen documents under food trays, fires to smoke out hiding killers when Holmes knew where they were the whole time, dramatic revelations--the detective loved to show off.

Perhaps that was only for his peers (and clients), and it was the applause of the general public which Holmes disdained...

**Watson on why so few of Holmes' cases were published: "My participation in some if his adventures was always a privilege which entailed discretion and reticence upon me."

Well, sure. But by your own admission, you had records of hundreds of cases--hundreds!! Quit holding out on us!!Discretion be damned!

**Apocryphal case : "Dr. Moore Agar, of Harley Street, whose dramatic introduction to Holmes I may some day recount..."

It was never recounted. Boo!

**Watson is once again a poor travel agent, painting a fairly bleak portrait of Cornwall:

We looked down upon the whole sinister semicircle of Mounts Bay, that old death trap of sailing vessels, with its fringe of black cliffs and surge-swept reefs on which innumerable seamen have met their end. With a northerly breeze it lies placid and sheltered, inviting the storm-tossed craft to tack into it for rest and protection. Then come the sudden swirl round of the wind, the blistering gale from the south-west, the dragging anchor, the lee shore, and the last battle in the creaming breakers. The wise mariner stands far out from that evil place...It was a country of rolling moors, lonely and dun-colored...

Obviously their vacation was not endorsed by the Cornish Tourism Bureau...

**Man, sometimes you just don't get to enjoy your time off:

We found ourselves, even in that land of dreams, plunged into a problem at our very doors which was more intense, more engrossing, and infinitely more mysterious than any of those which had driven us from London. Our simple life and peaceful, healthy routine were violently interrupted, and we were precipitated into the midst of a series of events which caused the utmost excitement not only in Cornwall but throughout the whole west of England.

Yeah, sometime work bothers me on my attempted day off, too. Nothing as exciting as the Cornish Horror, though!

**Watson, angry at the attempt to interrupt Holmes' rest, gets as close to rude as a Victorian gentleman can get with guests: "I glared at the intrusive vicar with no very friendly eyes..." Dude, where are your manners?

The Granada adaptation has Watson trying much harder, and with much less discretion, to keep Holmes out of the case. With just as much success.

**Wonderful, well also terrible and terrifying, tableau:

His two brothers and his sister were seated round the table exactly as he had left them, the cards still spread in front of them and the candles burned down to their sockets. The sister lay back stone-dead in her chair, while the two brothers sat on each side of her laughing, shouting, and singing, the senses stricken clean out of them. All three of them, the dead woman and the two demented men, retained upon their faces an expression of the utmost horror--a convulsion of terror which was dreadful to look upon.

Horrifying stuff. And to their credit, both BBC 1965 and Granada do a wonderful job of portraying this scene.

**"Mrs. Porter, the old cook and housekeeper, who declared that she had slept deeply and heard no sound during the night."

OK, hold one just one minute--if our victims were "laughing, shouting and singing," wouldn't she have heard something?!? Shouting?!?

Holmes doesn't see anything wrong with this, and declares, "Mrs. Porter may be eliminated. She is evidently harmless." But really, this is too dismissive by far. She claims not to have heard any of the ruckus the insane gentlemen were making. She would have been just as able to put the devil's foot into the fireplace as Mortimer, if not more so--who notices servants? And her insistence on leaving immediately might be another red flag.

Granted, she has no motive that we know of, and no access to Doctor Sterndale's African mementos. But it seems unwise to eliminate her as a suspect, especially if we consider the possibility that she might have been acting as an accomplice to someone else...

**"We were a family of tin-miners at Redruth, but we sold our venture to a company, and so retired with enough to keep us. I won't deny that there was some feeling about the division of the money..."

Is there some reason that it wasn't merely a 3-way split? Or 4-way? Why was Mortimer so aggrieved? Did he actually receive less, or did he feel that he deserved more? Did he think that Brenda should not have been included in the division of funds, which would have reduced his share? Had he not wanted to sell in the first place?

Without any details on the dispute, it's hard to evaluate how credible is was as a motive for Mortimer to go so far as to eliminate his entire family.

**Mortimer Tregennis claims that he and his brother saw...something outside the window the night of the tragedy:

I could just make out the bushes on the lawn, and it seemed to me for a moment that I saw something moving among them. I couldn't even say if it was man or animal, but I just thought there was something there...

"Did you not investigate?"

"No; the matter passed as unimportant."

Now, Holmes concludes that no one could have been seen through the window, and therefore the story must be untrue, and therefore Mortimer must be lying, trying to distract Holmes.

Yet Sherlock overanalyzes this, I think, claiming that Tregennis' vague tale said several things that he didn't actually say.

Even though Mortimer never said with any certainty that they saw a person--"something moving, I couldn't say if it was man or animal"--Holmes goes on to claim that Tregennis had said they saw an actual person: "Anyone who had the design to alarm these people would be compelled to place his very face against the glass before he could be seen." Well, sure, but that's not what Tregennis said that he saw!

Holmes always says that Tregennis claimed the family was terrified by what they saw: "It is difficult to imagine, then, how an outsider could have made so terrible an impression upon the company." Of course, Tregennis said no such thing--"the matter passed as unimportant."

Holmes establishes that there was likely no one there. But anyone who has caught a shadow moving out of the corner of their eye at night can tell you that nothing can look like something. In all likelihood Tregennis was making his story up--but it is not beyond the pale that there was a bird or animal or some of debris blown by the wind that created the "movement." Holmes, meanwhile, has to vastly inflate what Tregennis told him in order to be able to "disprove" it. Poor deduction/argumentation, Sherlock!

**Oh, Sherlock...you and your methods!

So absorbed was he in his thoughts, I remember, that he stumbled over the watering-pot, upset its contents, and deluged both our feet and the garden path.

Both Granada and BBC 1965 have Holmes physically bump Tregennis into the dirt of a garden in order to get his footprints...

**Sterndale: "This villain had thought that I would be at sea before the news could reach me, and that I should be lost for years in Africa."

Some have questioned why Mortimer didn't wait until he was certain Sterndale was gone to enact his plan. Well, perhaps this explains it:

Holmes: "Why a fire?" he asked once. "Had they always a fire in this small room on a spring evening?" Mortimer Tregennis explained that the night was cold and damp.

Perhaps this explains why Mortimer had to act so quickly--he felt that he had to use the fireplace, and as the spring weather warmed, there might not be any more cold and damp nights until fall. If he were to use the fireplace, it had to be now, which justified the remote risk of Sterndale being notified and returning. As it was, word only reached the hunter just before he departed the country...

**At the beginning of the tale, Watson tell us:

Shortly after our breakfast hour, as we were smoking together, preparatory to our daily excursion upon the moors.

But later, Sherlock says:

I think, Watson, that I shall resume that course of tobacco-poisoning which you have so often and so justly condemned...

So wait--which is it Watson? If you condemned Holmes tobacco use, why the hell were you smoking with him in the morning? Perhaps you were only referring to Holmes' excessive use of tobacco. But even if that were true, your smoking with him sure isn't helping him cut down any! Physician, heal thyself!!

**Holmes: "To let the brain work without sufficient material is like racing an engine. It racks itself to pieces."

That's sort of a condemnation of the enforced vacation as cure for nervous exhaustion, isn't it? Sherlock's mind needs something to occupy it...enforced rest with no mental challenges may be the exact opposite of what he needs to recover--as both this story and the Reigate Squires seems to establish!

**Watson's description of the great white hunter:

The huge body, the craggy and deeply seamed face with the fierce eyes and hawk-like nose, the grizzled hair which nearly brushed our cottage ceiling, the beard--golden at the fringes and white near the lips, save for the nicotine stain from his perpetual cigar--all these were as well known in London as in Africa, and could only be associated with the tremendous personality of Dr. Leon Sterndale, the great lion-hunter and explorer.

**Sterndale "lived an absolutely lonely life, attending to his own simple wants and paying little apparent heed to the affairs of his neighbors."

Well, obviously that wasn't true, as we learn that he was courting Brenda and hanging out with various members of the Tregennis family. Given the intense gossip in little villages like that, how was this relationship kept a secret?

**Another great "Holmes suddenly on the hunt" moment:

One realized the red-hot energy which underlay Holmes's phlegmatic exterior when one saw the sudden change which came over him from the moment that he entered the fatal apartment. In an instant he was tense and alert, his eyes shining, his face set, his limbs quivering with eager activity.

**Holmes: "I cannot remain to discuss the matter with the police..."

Why ever not?

Sherlock doesn't make any effort to inform the police of his investigation, except to send cryptic messages through the vicar. Heavens, people are being murdered in the most horrible fashion--this is no time for your silly games, Sherlock. At least in the Granada version, the police explicitly tell Sherlock not get involved, so there is a reason for him not to share with them.

Watson tells us later, "It may be that the police resented the intrusion of an amateur, or that they imagined themselves to be upon some hopeful line of investigation; but it is certain that we heard nothing from them for the next two days." Idiots.

**Whatever the state of Holmes' mental health, he's still pretty sharp, deducing the existence of a heat-activated mind-altering drug when something like that had been completely unknown before:

In each case there is evidence of a poisonous atmosphere. In each case, also, there is combustion going on in the room--in the one case a fire, in the other a lamp. The fire was needed, but the lamp was lit--as a comparison of the oil consumed will show--long after it was broad daylight. Why? Surely because there is some connection between three things--the burning, the stuffy atmosphere, and, finally, the madness or death of those unfortunate people. That is clear, is it not?

**Ah, Victorian sexism, even in the autopsy phase?

...so, since in the first case only the woman, who had presumably the more sensitive organism, was killed, the others exhibiting that temporary or permanent lunacy which is evidently the first effect of the drug.

Of course, it's possible that for some reason woman are more susceptible to the devil's foot. Or perhaps Brenda had a more tenuous hold on her sanity to begin with? But nope, woman are more vulnerable because they are "more sensitive." Which is not far from Spock's "woman are more easily and more deeply terrified." So it's not just the Victorian era.

The Granada adaptation does away with this, asserting that Brenda died merely because she was sitting closest to the fireplace, and thus received a bigger dose than her brothers...

**Let's just acknowledge this: Stupidest. Experiment. Ever. And of course, after it is over, Holmes himself acknowledges it.

Especially given that he is, theoretically, under treatment for extreme mental stress, exposing himself to mind-altering substances might not be the brightest idea.

Of course, we do have to understand Holmes' dilemma here. All he had was speculation that this substance behaved like no other substance known to man did, and that someone could deliberately use this powder to literally frighten people to death. Certainly the local authorities weren't interested in Holmes conclusions, nor would they be able to get there themselves.

So if Holmes were to prove anything, if he were to know that he was right, there had to be an experiment. And, let's be honest--for the reader to accept the premise, she had to see it in action, and see someone as grounded as the good Doctor Watson brought to edge of madness by the devil's foot.

And, in fairness, Holmes was properly chastened and apologetic afterwards.

**TV adaptations wish they could be this effectively frightening:

I had hardly settled in my chair before I was conscious of a thick, musky odour, subtle and nauseous. At the very first whiff of it my brain and my imagination were beyond all control. A thick, black cloud swirled before my eyes, and my mind told me that in this cloud, unseen as yet, but about to spring out upon my appalled senses, lurked all that was vaguely horrible, all that was monstrous and inconceivably wicked in the universe. Vague shapes swirled and swam amid the dark cloud-bank, each a menace and a warning of something coming, the advent of some unspeakable dweller upon the threshold, whose very shadow would blast my soul...The turmoil within my brain was such that something must surely snap. I tried to scream and was vaguely aware of some hoarse croak which was my own voice, but distant and detached from myself...

Well done, Sir Arthur.

The question, of course, is how the hell do you portray this on screen!

Wisely, the 1965 BBC adaptation really doesn't try to show us exactly what Holmes and Watson we experiencing. They just gave us tracking close-up shots of our actors' faces, and everything is done merely merely with facial movements. It's is terrifyingly effective, and given the level of TV technology at the BBC in those days, a wise decision to leave it all in the actors' hands.

Granada is less successful, although I certainly don't blame them for trying. Sadly, though, Holmes' nightmares are merely flashback clips of previous episodes, particularly Moriarty and the Reichenbach Falls, glossed over what looks like very amateurish and crude paint box effects. We also don't get to see any of what Watson experiences, which robs him of a bit of his agency and heroism in his ability to rouse himself in the need to save his friend.

No, the better approach is to leave the actors to suggest what's going on, and let the audience fill in the rest themselves.

**As foolish as the experiment was, it does provide us with perhaps our purest glimpse of the friendship between Watson and Holmes.

Watson: "It was that vision (of Holmes in torment"which gave me an instant of sanity and of strength..."

Holmes: "Upon my word, Watson!" said Holmes at last with an unsteady voice, "I owe you both my thanks and an apology. It was an unjustifiable experiment even for one's self, and doubly so for a friend. I am really very sorry."

"You know," I answered with some emotion, for I have never seen so much of Holmes's heart before, "that it is my greatest joy and privilege to help you."

Oh, you two....

**Holmes: "When I think of Mortimer Tregennis, with the foxy face and the small shrewd, beady eyes behind the spectacles, he is not a man whom I should judge to be of a particularly forgiving disposition."

Another example of Doyle equating moral weakness with physical appearance.

For what it's worth, in the 1965 BBC adaptation, Mortimer Tregennis is played by a pre-Doctor Who Patrick Troughton.

**Watson raises an interesting possibility:

"Then his own death was suicide!"

"Well, Watson, it is on the face of it a not impossible supposition. The man who had the guilt upon his soul of having brought such a fate upon his own family might well be driven by remorse to inflict it upon himself."

Of course, we know that Mortimer was murdered. Still, we are never given any glimpse into his psyche after the tragedy befall his family. How guilty does he feel? Does he regret it? What would he have done if Holmes had caught him? Or would he have come forward on his own, plagued by shame and horror? We'll never know, thanks to Leon Sterndale.

For what it's worth, the 1965 BBC adaptation has Tregennis telling Sterndale that he never meant for Brenda to die, only for her to be driven insane. Well, that was not exactly going to calm Sterndale down, was it?

**Classic:

"I followed you."

"I saw no one."

"That is what you may expect to see when I follow you."

**Sterndale: "I could not marry her, for I have a wife who has left me for years and yet whom, by the deplorable laws of England, I could not divorce."

Gee, I wonder why she left him?

As we've mentioned before, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was a great advocate for reforming England's draconian divorce laws. Usually, though, they were portrayed as victimizing woman...

**"It has not yet found its way either into the pharmacopoeia or into the literature of toxicology."

At the time of publication, the effects of radix pedis diaboli surely seemed fanciful at best. Of course, Once LSD and other hallucinogens were discovered, the possibility of a drug causing visions so extreme they melt your brain seemed less far-fetched.

Of course, there were always hallucinatory plants and fungus out there. And this "devil's foot" has the sound of some rumor or legend that Doyle had heard about somewhere. Old wives' tale? Something that perhaps actually existed, but is lost to history?

And a drug that acts only on the fear centers of the human brain? Surely Jonathan Crane, a.k.a. the Batman villain Scarecrow, read this story as a youth...

**Sterndale's thought on Tregennis' motives: "for the sake of money, and with the idea, perhaps, that if the other members of his family were all insane he would be the sole guardian of their joint property..."

That begs a couple of questions. Were the effects of the devil's foot permanent? Were his brothers insane forever?

And now, with Mortimer deceased...who gets the estate??

**Terrible theory, and I apologize for making it: Brenda and Leon were in love. What if she had willed her portion of the money to Sterndale? There's a possible motive for him to be the murderer (perhaps with the maid Porter as the accomplice?).

Or...perhaps the brothers feared that, should Brenda actually end up being able to marry Sterndale, they would lose the use of her portion of the funds. So one (or both) planned to drive her mad with the powder--surely, if Sterndale had told Mortimer, whom he disliked, about it, he told others--but something went terribly wrong...

This is why they don't let me write mysteries...

**Holmes lit his pipe and handed me his pouch. "Some fumes which are not poisonous would be a welcome change..."

Oh, the years before the Surgeon General's report...

**So, given that Holmes kept the whole affair quiet, what were the ultimate conclusions of the police? Did they even call it a murder spree, or just write it off as some unexplained natural (or supernatural) event? What about the press? What did they report? What were the conclusions that a fearful public was left with for over a decade?!?

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--HIS LAST BOW

The Adventure of The Terminally Late Blog Post!!

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 09 Aug 2015 12:00:00 +0000

OK, so I suck.

Real life, and my occasionally poor ability to handle it, means I'm going to have to take yet another week until I finally get to The Adventure of The Devil's Foot. Sorry.

As a means of totally inadequate recompense, allow me to share the following with you.

**MR. HOLMES

This is a wonderful movie. Ian McKellen stars as a 93 year old Holmes, his mind starting to go, struggling to remember why his last case caused him to retire thirty years earlier. Highly recommended.

**WITHOUT A CLUE:

Finally available on Blu-ray and affordable DVD, Without A Clue is the fanciful tale of how Doctor John Watson (Ben Kingsley) began solving crimes as a hobby, but quickly found that was considered socially unacceptable for a doctor. So he hired an actor (Michael Caine) to portray the character he invents--Sherlock Holmes!--to take the credit for solving his cases!!

Tremendously funny, worth it just to see Kingsley & Caine. Go and rent it, or buy it, or whatever you kids do these days.

**SHERLOCK HOLMES: EXAMINING THE EVIDENCE--IN CHARTS!!

Data analysis is the hip thing with all you children these days, so you might enjoy this Guardian article breaking down lots of aspects of the Canon into charts and graphs. Sample:

Obviously, some of the conclusions depend upon your interpretation of things, so feel to bang away in the comments sections there.

There--I've salved my cinscience by providing you alternate entertainment for the week.

We'll be back next week with Devil's Foot, guaranteed--or your money back.

The Disappearance Of Lady Frances Carfax--A Very Pretty Hash, Indeed!

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 26 Jul 2015 12:00:00 +0000

Sherlock Holmes is, no doubt, a great detective, and a great friend of John Watson.

Except, of course, when he isn't either of those things.

Which bring us to The Disappearance Of Lady France Carfax.

There are a lot of nice touches in this story. The dialogue is crisp, the villains' plan seems clever (until you think about it for 10 seconds), there is great action, and a last-minute rescue.

But boy oh boy, I really think that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle blows this tale in several way. Holmes is a particular jackass to Watson, when Watson clearly doesn't deserve it. Holmes behavior in investigating the case is extremely illogical, and in all honesty he does not much to solve the case--if the villains aren't stupid, they get away. The behavior of our little criminal gang makes no sense, as it is never explained why they go from con artists to kidnappers and murderers. And at the end, Holmes (and Doyle) seem completely disinterested in the fate of the victim of these crimes, and the story gives us zero closure.

All in all, it's very irritating, as the negatives quickly overwhelm the positives in the story.

For the investigation of this case, Holmes sends Watson to do his legwork for him. It's not the first time, and it can be good to see Watson in solo action. But unlike Hound Of The Baskervilles, this time when Holmes surprisingly turns up in the middle of the story, he doesn't praise Watson, but archly criticizes him:

"A very pretty hash you have made of it...And a singularly consistent investigation you have made, my dear Watson," said he. "I cannot at the moment recall any possible blunder which you have omitted. The total effect of your proceeding has been to give the alarm everywhere and yet to discover nothing."

Well, this may the most unfair thing Sherlock has ever said to John.

As to "giving the alarm everywhere," how is that? The villains have no idea that Watson is on their trail. As to confronting Philip Green, Holmes did the very same thing himself just a few hours later!! Granted, it didn't end in a violent fight, but that was hardly Watson's fault. And Watson found out that the "Shlessingers" and Lady Carfax had headed for London weeks ago--so seriously, what more did he expect Watson to accomplish?

We also cannot fault Watson's identification of Green as the likeliest suspect. Given that Watson doesn't have Holmes' encyclopaedic knowledge of European con men, he had no reason to suspect the Shlessingers. And Holmes certainly could have been more forthcoming in his cables--he's deliberately leaving Watson at a disadvantage, and then berating him for it!

But looked at through modern eyes, Philip Green is clearly--very clearly--a dangerous stalker who was a threat to Lady Frances, physically and emotionally. In a modern mystery there would be no doubt about how dangerous he was (even if he didn't turn out to be the actual culprit).

Note that we never get to consult with Lady Carfax in this story, so the only tale of Green's relationship with her comes from his perspective:

I was a wild youngster, I know--not worse than others of my class. But her mind was pure as snow. She could not bear a shadow of coarseness. So, when she came to hear of things that I had done, she would have no more to say to me. And yet she loved me--that is the wonder of it!--loved me well enough to remain single all her sainted days just for my sake alone.

A nice enough story; yet "she wouldn't marry me, but she wouldn't marry anybody else because of me" is fairly obviously self-serving, and likely somewhat delusional.

Again, we don't hear from Frances, but what are the eyewitness accounts of their meetings on the continent? As Watson tells us, "He had been seen talking earnestly to Madame on the promenade by the lake. Then he had called. She had refused to see him." Her maid's account gives us more chilling details: "With her own eyes she had seen him seize the lady's wrist with great violence on the public promenade by the lake."

It sure doesn't like as if she loved him, does it? "...[B]ut many little signs had convinced the maid that her mistress lived in a state of continual nervous apprehension." And Marie added, "She believed that it was out of dread of him that Lady Frances had accepted the escort of the Shlessingers to London."

This is classic stalker/victim behavior, isn't it? He approaches her, she rebuffs him, he loses his temper, she refuses to see him when he calls again, she seeks protection from being alone with him, and she is clearly in an emotionally upset and fearful state. Add to that the fact that when Frances left Lausanne, "there had been some secrecy, which confirmed the idea that she had gone with the intention of throwing someone off her track," a clear indication that she did not want Mr. Green's company!!

Watson's conclusion, far from being a blunder, rings chillingly true: "Here was this good and pious lady pursued from place to place by a sinister and unrelenting figure. She feared him, or she would not have fled from Lausanne. He had still followed. Sooner or later he would overtake her." Every single part of that was correct.

Green himself admits to some dangerous tendencies, although he tries to make light of it. His violent attack on Watson? "Indeed, I'm not responsible in these days. My nerves are like live wires." Just because the Doctor dared question him about Lady Carfax. And his "wooing" of her? "I found her at Lausanne and tried all I knew. She weakened, I think, but her will was strong, and when next I called she had left the town." By his own words, she said no, and he was trying to break down her will!!

A violence-prone suitor who won't take no for an answer, and follows her across continents, driving her into a state of fear and tension? This is the man in whose care Holmes left lady Carfax at he end of the story: "And here is someone who has a better right to nurse this lady than we have. Good morning, Mr. Green."

GOOD GOD, MAN, HE'S HER STALKER!!!! He's part of the reason she needs to be nursed!?!? What the hell, Sherlock?!?!?!?!

Despite his insistence that he had already done better, Holmes investigation makes little sense, either. Watson telegrams him that the party had left for London three weeks ago. Why, in heaven's name then, does Holmes come to Montpelier, when the missing woman and those he think responsible for her disappearance are thought to be in London?

His explanation makes little sense: "...finding that he could get away from London, he determined to head me off at the next obvious point of my travels." What? He could have sent you a telegram, John!! Instead, he wastes two days traveling to meet you for no real purpose, when he could have spent that time searching for the criminals and their victim! Seriously--the lady is missing, Holmes fears her in the clutches of terrible villains, her life in danger, and knows they left for London. So what possible reason is there to come to France, to a city where Carfax and the Shlessingers never went?! Unforgivable, and unexplainable, except that Sir Arthur wanted to have Holmes pull off one of his patented "disguise that fools even Watson" tricks.

The other blunder in the story is Sir Arthur's portrayal of what, exactly, Holy Peters' plan is.

Holmes initially portrays him as a con man: "His particular specialty is the beguiling of lonely ladies by playing upon their religious feelings..." He fleeces lonely women out of money. Yet, somehow, he and his wife graduated to kidnapping and murder?

Holmes lays out clearly enough that the kidnapping is motive for the murder: if they let Lady Carfax go, she will of course turn them into the police. Therefore, to keep her silent, they must kill her.

But...Holmes himself tells us that "these people had never, to my knowledge, done a murder." Which means, most likely, they had never resorted to kidnapping before, right? They get women to give them checks and cash for their "spiritual work," maybe in an extreme case actually burgle their jewelry...so what in the heck happened this time? How did they go from being grifters to physically imprisoning a noblewoman for over 4 weeks, and then trying to kill her, when Holmes told us they had never done anything of the sort before?

Did they discover the her jewels were incredibly valuable, and couldn't find a way to get them peacefully? Did she somehow discover that something nefarious was going on, and was going to the police to tell them of the Peters' scams, and they over-reacted by hitting her or something, and decided that they had no choice now but hold her hostage? Why wait 4+ weeks to start selling off the jewels? If they had done it weeks earlier, before Holmes got the word out to pawn-brokers, they never would have been caught! Why the very elaborate scheme to kill her, if they had just planned on vanishing afterwards anyway?!?

So Holmes (and Doyle) did indeed make a very pretty hash of it. Holmes chastises Watson for a fine investigation, and for zeroing in on the most likely suspect. Holmes' investigation leaves much to be desired, and he ends up leaving the victim in her stalkers' care!! And Holmes can't seem to make up their minds whether the criminals are grifters or sadistic murdering masterminds, or why they make the gruesome transition.

For these reasons, as well as some others we'll discuss below, The Disappearance Of Lady Frances Carfax is rather disappointing, despite some clever touches.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**I've got to get this off my chest first thing: There is an outfit here in America called CARFAX, that helps you shop for used cars and can (for a fee) provide a complete repair history of the vehicle you're interested in buying. The premise of the commercials is customers demanding that the dealer provide them with a CARFAX report, with the tagline "Show me the CARFAX!"

So, that was bouncing around my head the whole time with this story...

**The Granada adaptation once again contained many differences. I'm lazy today, so I'll just cut and paste the Wikipedia summary:

The action takes place entirely in the Lake District of England, where the holidaying Doctor often sees the Lady (and her stalker Philip Green) at the hotel before her disappearance; she has a brother; her jewellery is French rather than Spanish; no mention is made of the maid; Peters is not Australian and does not have a bitten ear, but is in a wheelchair; Green made his fortune in Australia rather than in South Africa; there is no police intervention at the house; the coffin is opened at the cemetery rather than at the house; Lady Frances is traumatised by her experience (though Holmes says that "There is every hope of a full recovery"); and Holmes acknowledges the case as one of his few true failures and refuses to be rewarded by Green.

So, yeah, a little bit different.

Sometimes I wonder if the writers of the Granada adaptations were paid by the number of pointless changes they make to the original story...

**This is the first time in some while that we've begun a story with the "Holmes baffling Watson with some personal deductions" in awhile. I had thought that Sir Arthur had just grown tired of the device. But it's back!

**Watson getting persnickety at Holmes' sauciness: "I don't admit that a fresh illustration is an explanation," said I with some asperity. "Bravo, Watson! A very dignified and logical remonstrance."

**One of Holmes' most famous epigraphs:

One of the most dangerous classes in the world," said he, "is the drifting and friendless woman. She is the most harmless and often the most useful of mortals, but she is the inevitable inciter of crime in others. She is helpless. She is migratory. She has sufficient means to take her from country to country and from hotel to hotel. She is lost, as often as not, in a maze of obscure pensions and boardinghouses. She is a stray chicken in a world of foxes. When she is gobbled up she is hardly missed."

This could have been the starting point for us to have a discussion about the role of single women in Victorian/Edwardian England. But sadly, the story gives us nothing else. We never meet a conscious Lady Frances; we never learn the specifics of how she was entangled with the Shlessingers; we know precious little about her life.

Yes, she was pursued by a stalker, but Holmes is unconcerned with that, and it could as likely happened at home. Yes, she fell in with some con men, but they were usually non-violent. And her being "lost" initially is her own decision, to hide her movements to put off Green.

So it's hard to say if this is just another example of Holmes' sexism, or if the "drifitng woman" really was a problem of the era.

**Just how wealthy was Lady Frances Carfax?

We get conflicting signals. Her family estates went to "the male line," so "she was left with limited means, but with some very remarkable old Spanish jewellery of silver and curiously cut diamonds to which she was fondly attached."

But Lady Frances is traveling the continent, staying in luxurious hotels. She gives her maid £50 as a wedding gift. She leaves Lausanne on a day's notice, paying a week's rent for the early departure.

She has the remarkable jewelry, which the criminals coveted; but there is no evidence that they made any attempt to access her bank account. She allowed the Reverend Doctor Shlessinger to pay her hotel bill, and apparently for her travel. Was she broke after that extravagant gift?

Despite the fact that Holmes describes Lady Frances as "the last derelict of what only twenty years ago was a goodly fleet," her family certainly isn't poor: "The family are anxious, and as they are exceedingly wealthy no sum will be spared if we can clear the matter up."

That comes in consecutive paragraphs. Sloppy writing? Or is Holmes just speaking relatively of her "limited means"--rich to you and I, but a pauper compared to her family?

**Holmes: "Single ladies must live, and their passbooks are compressed diaries."

A wise observation...although in this case the bank account did nothing to solve the mystery. And how did Holmes get that information? Did he get the information from the family? Or did he do another trick to (illegally, no doubt?) wheedle the information out of the bank?

**Apocryphal case: "old Abrams is in such mortal terror of his life" that Holmes cannot leave London.

**Again Holmes is too bust to take up an important case. Not only is the Abrams case keeping him busy, but "on general principles it is best that I should not leave the country. Scotland Yard feels lonely without me, and it causes an unhealthy excitement among the criminal classes."

Pithy, and perhaps more full of self-praise than we're used to seeing from Holmes. But of course, just a few days later Holmes does leave the country, quite unnecessarily. Was the Abrams case cleared up (or was he dead?!)?

**Victorian con men: Lady Carfax...

...found the acquaintance of a Dr. Shlessinger and his wife, a missionary from South America. Like most lonely ladies, Lady Frances found her comfort and occupation in religion...Dr. Shlessinger's remarkable personality, his whole hearted devotion, and the fact that he was recovering from a disease contracted in the exercise of his apostolic duties affected her deeply.

Later we learn...

...The Rev. Dr. Shlessinger, missionary from South America, is none other than Holy Peters...His particular specialty is the beguiling of lonely ladies by playing upon their religious feelings, and his so-called wife, an Englishwoman named Fraser, is a worthy helpmate

This is one bit the Granada adaptation keeps, and expands on. "Shlessinger" uses fake slide shows and testimonials of his good works to bilk donations from other guests and the local church.

As to whether "most lonely ladies" find solace and occupation in religion? And whether that made them more vulnerable to being scammed? Well, remember, this is Watson speaking here, and not Holmes, so it shouldn't automatically be dismissed as the same old Holmes "misogyny." One suspects that Doyle was basing this on stories he had heard, and perhaps even acquaintances...

**More signs that the Doyle's presentation of the Holmes/Watson relationship is "off" in this tale:

To Holmes I wrote showing how rapidly and surely I had got down to the roots of the matter. In reply I had a telegram asking for a description of Dr. Shlessinger's left ear. Holmes's ideas of humour are strange and occasionally offensive, so I took no notice of his ill-timed jest...

Yes, Holmes could be infuriatingly cryptic. But surely Watson wouldn't be so cavalier to reject such a specific request as a "jest," and would have wondered why Holmes asked.

**Watson: "The situation was awkward, but the most direct way is often the best." Of course, that most direct way resulted in a violent fight, so...maybe not the best way after all?

**Some have questioned Watson's losing in the fight. But let's recall that, just a few pages earlier, he had been feeling "rheumatic and old," while every person's description of Green is a giant savage. Throw in John's war wound(s) and the surprise nature of the attack, it's no surprise that Green had an advantage on him.

**Holmes was clearly not being sponsored by the Australian Travel Bureau: "Holy Peters, one of the most unscrupulous rascals that Australia has ever evolved--and for a young country it has turned out some very finished types."

What did you expect when you sent all of your criminals there?

**Holmes:

It is always possible that she never reached London, or that she has passed through it, but the former is improbable, as, with their system of registration, it is not easy for foreigners to play tricks with the Continental police; and the latter is also unlikely, as these rouges could not hope to find any other place where it would be as easy to keep a person under restraint.

Oh, come now, Sherlock! One enduring cliche of the Canon is how darned easy it is for thieves, murderers and scalawags of all types to come and go as easy as you please, slipping from country to country with no one to stop their flight from justice. Seriously, not once is a criminal who flees the country apprehended by authorities in the Canon--not once!

Meanwhile, London is the best place to keep a secret prisoner? Really? The biggest city in the continent is the best place to keep her? Again, this flies in the face of the Holmes in Copper Beeches, where he says horrid crimes are much easier in rural areas!

The pressure of public opinion can do in the town what the law cannot accomplish. There is no lane so vile that the scream of a tortured child, or the thud of a drunkard's blow, does not beget sympathy and indignation among the neighbours, and then the whole machinery of justice is ever so close that a word of complaint can set it going, and there is but a step between the crime and the dock. But look at these lonely houses, each in its own fields, filled for the most part with poor ignorant folk who know little of the law. Think of the deeds of hellish cruelty, the hidden wickedness which may go on, year in, year out, in such places, and none the wiser. Had this lady who appeals to us for help gone to live in Winchester, I should never have had a fear for her. It is the five miles of country which makes the danger.

So, has recent experience changed Sherlock's mind?

**Some have critiqued whether Green was correct when Holmes asked, "These people do not know you by sight?" Remember, Green didn't show up up Baden until "a week ago," two weeks after the Shlessingers had left. They had never seen him! And they were not at Lausanne when he was their, either.

Still, why not have someone else watch, someone more trustworthy and especially someone notably visually and less prone to violence?

**Holmes, on the legality of rushing in: "We can do nothing legal without a warrant, and you can serve the cause best by taking this note down to the authorities and getting one."

That might seem to fly in the face of other excursions where we've seen Holmes not worry about legal niceties. But obviously, he's just trying to get Green out of the way before they start the real rescue business:

We are, as usual, the irregulars, and we must take our own line of action. The situation strikes me as so desperate that the most extreme measures are justified...We simply can't afford to wait for the police or to keep within the four corners of the law.

As usual, Holmes is clear about the limits of legalities, and is willing to bend the law (and risk losing a conviction--or perhaps even facing jail himself!) in order to save a life.

**Holmes theory that Lady Frances is already dead, and Peters is trying to bury her to bury the deed:

Surely that they have done her to death in some way which has deceived the doctor and simulated a natural end--poisoning, perhaps. And yet how strange that they should ever let a doctor approach her unless he were a confederate, which is hardly a credible proposition."

Because, of course, there are no evil or corrupt doctors...

"Could they have forged a medical certificate?" "Dangerous, Watson, very dangerous. No, I hardly see them doing that."

How dangerous can it forging a medical certificate be, if they've already committed murder? Is the British Medical Association going to come after them?

**Peters is a pretty cool customer:

"I'd be very glad if you could tell me where that lady may be," Peters answered coolly. "I've a bill against her for a nearly a hundred pounds, and nothing to show for it but a couple of trumpery pendants that the dealer would hardly look at. She attached herself to Mrs. Peters and me at Baden--it is a fact that I was using another name at the time--and she stuck on to us until we came to London. I paid her bill and her ticket. Once in London, she gave us the slip, and, as I say, left these out- of-date jewels to pay her bills.

Since we're never told how much money they received from pawning the jewelry, it's tough to judge how this story might play in court. We're told the jewelry was "remarkable." If the pawn shop gave them anything near what they were worth, that would put lie to Peters' claim that these were merely "trumpery pendants."

**Peters' explanation of the dead woman: "Well, if you really must know, she is an old nurse of my wife's, Rose Spender by name, whom we found in the Brixton Workhouse Infirmary."

Was she really the wife's old nurse? Or did they just pluck some random old woman out of the infirmary, hoping she was close to death?

And having her die of natural causes within three days is frightfully convenient, no matter what the doctor said. How could they be sure she wouldn't linger for weeks? I have a hard time believing they wouldn't nudge her along, perhaps by not feeding her...?

**Our police sergeant is a good copper--he defuses the confrontation and gets Holmes to leave--but he lets Holmes know that he believes the detective, and promises to keep an eye on the place until the warrant arrives.

To bad he wasn't around the next morning, when the felons flee unobserved...

**Police bureaucracy: "There had been difficulties of procedure in regard to the warrant. Some delay was inevitable. The magistrate's signature might not be obtained until next morning."

Ah, unexplained technicalities to provide plot complications. How very "creaky episode of an American cop show"!

**"It's life or death--a hundred chances on death to one on life." In this case, the one wins. Too bad you were playing dress-up in Montpelier instead of searching London for her, when the odds might have been more in favor of life...

**Again, I'm not sure why Peters leaves Lady Frances alive as long as he does. If they're caught before the funeral, they're still guilty of robbery and kidnapping, as well as attempted murder in this case, with the victim found sealed in a soon to be interred coffin! Keeping her alive merely increases the chances of their being caught. Bumping attempted murder up to actual murder might have increased the potential legal consequences, but also might have greatly increased the chances of getting way with it. (Although in modern British law, attempted murder has the same maximum penalty as the sentence for actual murder, which would seem to eliminate the advantage of keeping her alive until the last minute. I do not know what the Victorian law said on the matter...)

Once they have the death certificate and coffin and old woman's body, what reason is there to keep her alive? Why put her alive into the coffin, except as an act of wanton cruelty? This belies Holmes' guess that, never having murdered before, they might "shrink from actual violence until the last." Anyone cruel enough to bury a woman alive--in a coffin with an already decaying body!--is not shrinking from much.

You almost wish they had succeed in their plan, and then been caught, to try this defense in front of a judge and jury. "We don't know how she got into the coffin!" "She was alive when we put her in there, so we didn't kill her!" Etc.

**Holmes: "Such slips are common to all mortals, and the greatest is he who can recognize and repair them." To bad you don't acknowledge the slips of trusting Green, and of abandoning the London search to come play dress-up for Watson in France...

**Holmes: "If our ex-missionary friends escape the clutches of Lestrade, I shall expect to hear of some brilliant incidents in their future career."

So instead of concern for Lady Frances' final fate--does she recover? Does she ever take up with Green?--Holmes admire the crooks, and looks forward to hearing of their later antics?? That's what we get instead of closure for Lady Frances Carfax's story?!? Man, this story irritates me!

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE DEVIL'S FOOT

The Adventure Of The Dying Detective--In Media Res!!

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 19 Jul 2015 12:00:00 +0000

It seems that the inevitable fate of many a mystery series is, well, a stultifying sameness.

As fans demand the same hero returning over and over again, the author churns out a novel (or more!) each year starring their dauntless detective. But at some point the spark seems to go out, the innovation is gone, and each story differs from the last only in the particulars of the crimes being investigated. Soon, Author E. Writer takes on a "co-writer" for the 23 novel about Detective Dick Investigator. And creativity is gone--who needs it, when every novel is guaranteed to debut on the best-seller list?

Which brings us to The Adventure of The Dying Detective.

Obviously, Sherlock Holmes stories are just that, and not novels. And surely the economics of the publishing racket of the day were a bit different.

Still, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle did have a gravy train going with Holmes, as fans eagerly awaited every word written about him. And given Doyle's famous ambivalence about his literary reputation being tied to the character, well, you have a recipe for authorial coasting. Who could have blamed Doyle if he just kept cranking out the same old same old?

But lordy, look at The Adventure Of The Dying Detective.

Sir Arthur completely breaks the Holmes formula here, giving us a completely new story structure for the Great Detective!! No, this is not another story that starts with Holmes and Watson lounging around 221B Baker Street, with Sherlock showing off in some way, until a client or the police show up asking for help.

Instead, at the outset, we're not even sure that we have a mystery! For the first time in quite a while, Doyle sets the story in the days of (one of?) Watson's marriage. And instead of a telegram from Holmes inviting Watson to join in on a new case, a third party--Mrs. Hudson!--seeks out the god doctor, as...Sherlock Holmes is dying!!

Think about how this must have seemed to contemporary readers! Once already, with no warning, Sir Arthur had killed off Sherlock Holmes. And now here he was, dying!! Without our hindsight that there were a good many tales left, readers at the time had to seriously consider the possibility that it was happening again! (Of course, in the second paragraph, Watson tells us that this story was set at least a couple of decades in the past, so readers could have grokked early on that this was a feint. But how many were that knowledgeable about the concept of continuity back then?)

Of course, there was a mystery here, and a good one. But Sir Arthur lets the information in tiny dribs and drabs, perhaps missed by the reader amidst Holmes' "delusional rantings." "His nephew, Watson--I had suspicions of foul play and I allowed him to see it. The boy died horribly. He has a grudge against me," sneaks in Holmes, between voicing serious concerns about oysters taking over the world.

And some of Holmes' behavior can certainly be seen as suspicious...but it can also easily be read as part of a mania resulting from his sickness. In retrospect, it's obvious what his game is with Watson--but the first time you read the story? The reader may be suspicious, but without the knowledge that more stories are coming? The uncertainty must have been maddening!

Starting the story in media res, and keeping the reader as uniformed as Watson, was a master stroke. It's doubtful that the story would have worked nearly as well had we started at the "beginning." For proof of that just go watch the Granada adaptation.

You have to feel pity for Granada--it's a fairly short story, and not a lot happens. As presented on the page, it would be hard to fill your 50+ minute timeslot with this tale.

So I can understand their attempt to pad out the time by actually presenting much of the background that's only alluded to in the actual story. But, to be honest, they waaaaay overdo it. It's 35 1/2 minutes into a 51 minutes show before we get to the point where the print story starts--Mrs. Hudson fetching Watson in a panic! 35 minutes!!

And, sadly, what they present, while well made, undercuts all of the tension that Doyle so masterfully presents in the original. We meet Victor Savage, who wishes to leave his job as director of the family bank to become a poet (!). Victor believes that opium will "open his senses" to improve his writing, and his cousin (not uncle, as in the original) Culverton Smith encourages that habit. Victor's wife goes to Holmes for help, but as no crime has been committed, there's not a lot he can do. Smith uses an infected mosquito (!) to dose Savage with a tropical disease as he lounges spaced-out in an opium den Smith helped him find.

(Do you sense that we're getting waaay too much detail here?)

Victor Savage has quite a lengthy getting sicker and ultimately dying sequence whilst playing children's games with his rich guests. Very lengthy. And Holmes and Watson are very certain that Smith is responsible for Savage's death, and vow both to Smith and his widow that justice will be served. Oh, yes, because of the will under which Savage inherited his house and wealth, it all reverts to his cousin Smith should he die, and we have quite the lengthy subplot with the callous Smith evicting the widow and her children and dogs. Remember, all of that was implied with one word in the original, so why not flesh it out to 8 or 9 minutes of screen time?

I'm too harsh here, as the Granada version is well made. But it completely eviscerates the tension and drama that the original provided, and indeed makes Watson seem particularly stupid. You can't have your co-star off screen for the first 35 minutes, of course, so Granada has the good doctor present for the entire case. Watson is convinced that Smith has used his expertise to kill Savage, and vows loudly and publicly to prove Smith's guilt and restore the widow to her rightful property. So when Holmes finally falls "ill" in this version, Watson has been involved with this case from the very beginning. He KNOWS who Culverton Smith is; he is convinced that Smith uses biological warfare to kill his victims; he has vowed to bring Smith to justice. So for John to believe, even for a second, that Holmes' disease is just a coincidence isn't believable. And for Watson to accede to Holmes' insistence on bringing Smith to Baker Street for treatment is simply not credible, given what the story has set up.

And, of course, the viewer is in the exact same position. By starting in media res, the written story creates doubt in our mind, and leaves us clueless as to Smith's role until much later. The Granada version, by insisting on giving us lots (and lots) of background, destroys that doubt, ruins that suspense, and makes the final reveal inevitable, instead of a surprise.

For the record, no, I don't know what I would have done if I were Granada in adapting this story.

But let's get back to the original story. 40-some stories into the Canon, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is still experimenting with storytelling techniques, still innovating. This story comes right after The Bruce-Partington Plans, considered by many to be one of the best Holmes stories. Coming soon would be His Last Bow, which would completely break the mold in a different way.

Yes, by the time we get to Casebook, we will discuss whether or not some stories show that Doyle had entered a "contractual obligation" phase.

But right now, in the stories collected in His Last Bow, Doyle was not content to just put out the same old same old. Although not always 100% successful, his stories show that he still believed there was a lot of life left in the old detective. He was creative in theme and structure, and was still striving to tell new mystery stories in new, innovative ways. And the Dying Detective does that in spades.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**The elephant in the room that everyone talks about is how cruel it was for Holmes to trick Watson this way. (Few complain that it was cruel to trick Mrs. Hudson that way, however...) They also complain about the nasty way Holmes denigrated Watson and his medical skills.

I am less down on Holmes about this than others. After all, allowing Watson to believe that he was dying for a few hours was far less cruel than allowing him to believe that you were dead for three long years.

Watson himself, despite declaring himself "bitterly hurt," took most of the rantings to be a result of Holmes' delirium, and he didn't allow it to slow his attempts to help his friend.

Holmes has deceived Watson many time, before and since, and I feel that the good doctor understands, as long as it is in the service of justice. And there is no other way the case could be cracked this time!

Declaring that Watson has no talent for "dissimulation" is, in and of itself a compliment to Watson, and Holmes apologizes most profusely (for Holmes, at least). And he goes on to praise Watson medical skills: "Do you imagine that I have no respect for your medical talents? Could I fancy that your astute judgment would pass a dying man who, however weak, had no rise of pulse or temperature? At four yards, I could deceive you."

So, is Holmes guilty of being a jerk? Sure, but it's for a good cause, and the pain is short-lived.

**Of course, Watson probably should have sussed that something was up. Holmes' insistence that Mrs. Hudson fetch only Watson belied any later comments he made. The "dying" man's "tiger-spring" to beat Watson to the door was certainly suspicious. And Holmes demand that Watson "convey an impression" of the detective's condition to Culverton Smith, and that Watson secretly return first to Baker Street, were pretty good tips that Holmes was enacting a plan.

Still, it is to Watson's credit that he was so concerned with his friend's condition that he gave no thought to the fact that this might be another scheme of Sherlock's.

**This story does little to buttress Holmes' reputation as a detective.

We have a murder, and an attempted murder, and Holmes cannot come up with a scrap of evidence--apparently not even enough to justify a warrant!!

In fairness, forensic science and medicine were still decades away from being able to do things like run DNA profiles of bacterium and compare them, which would likely be necessary in this case to convict Smith.

Still, we are left with a situation where Holmes doesn't so much solve the case, as trick the murderer into confessing. It was a pretty large gamble--how could Holmes be so sure that Smith would come to gloat over his deathbed? "Knowing his vindictive nature, I was perfectly certain that he would come to look upon his handiwork...It was clear to me, however, that by pretending that he had really succeeded in his design I might surprise a confession."

Still, it is a large leap that, no matter how "vindictive," Smith would come to Holmes, and would actually confess.

**The story also makes one thing perfectly clear: if Culverton Smith doesn't foolishly try unnecessarily to murder Holmes, he gets away scot free. Holmes couldn't prove Smith had killed Savage, which certainly means the police had no chance. Had Smith merely shut his mouth and endured Holmes' accusations, he would have gotten away with the murder. But he let himself be goaded, and by attempting to kill Holmes, he provided the evidence--and the confession--himself. Idiot!

Even had he succeeded in killing Sherlock, it almost certainly would have made Culverton Smith more vulnerable to the police, not less so. Smith admits that his nephew dying of an obscure tropical disease (in London--in November!) which he happened to be an expert on was a "singular coincidence." Did Smith really not understand that having his accuser die of the exact same thing would not make the coincidence theory completely untenable--particularly if there was no outbreak amongst the denizens of Rothertithe? That even the most pig-headed Scotland Yard inspector would have to act, had Holmes died as planned? Perhaps Smith was so arrogant he thought that he could still baffle the police...

**Holmes has come far from needing a roommate to afford the Baker Street flat!

On the other hand, his payments were princely. I have no doubt that the house might have been purchased at the price which Holmes paid for his rooms during the years that I was with him.

That certainly makes it seem as if "long-suffering" Mrs. Hudson was doing quite all right for herself.

**Watson on Holmes and the ladies:"...he had a remarkable gentleness and courtesy in his dealings with women. He disliked and distrusted the sex, but he was always a chivalrous opponent."

You know, for all that's been made of Holmes' alleged antipathy towards women, we've really seen very little of it--certainly not much worth then his general antipathy towards everyone! Most of what we know of Holmes' "misogyny" comes from Watson's descriptions, not anything that Holmes himself has said. Everything we've actually heard Sherlock himself say has said is no more dire than any male who mutters "Women..." after an exasperating encounter with the mysterious opposite sex.

So, Watson, what have you been keeping from us?

**"...in the second year of my married life..."

Granada again pretends that Watson never married, and never left Baker Street, which means that have to go through unconvincing contortions (making rounds in the country?) to explain how Sherlock had been deathly ill for three days without the doctor knowing.

**And the Academy Award for best make-up goes to..."His eyes had the brightness of fever, there was a hectic flush upon either cheek, and dark crusts clung to his lips; the thin hands upon the coverlet twitched incessantly, his voice was croaking and spasmodic."

**Say what you will about Watson, he is a selfless physician, willing to risk his own life:

"Contagious by touch, Watson--that's it, by touch. Keep your distance and all is well."

"Good heavens, Holmes! Do you suppose that such a consideration weighs with me of an instant? It would not affect me in the case of a stranger. Do you imagine it would prevent me from doing my duty to so old a friend?"

And he is also willing to swallow his ego and recommend "better" doctors, even when Holmes insults him:

But if you have no confidence in me I would not intrude my services. Let me bring Sir Jasper Meek or Penrose Fisher, or any of the best men in London. But someone you MUST have, and that is final. If you think that I am going to stand here and see you die without either helping you myself or bringing anyone else to help you, then you have mistaken your man."

This also shows that Watson, whatever the state of his practice, has been keeping up with his profession, and knows who the "best men" are. He also just "happens to know" that the greatest living authority on tropical disease is in London now. Watson is reading the papers and following his profession--how many general practitioners would have known that?!?

**Holmes tries to show Watson his "ignorance":

"Shall I demonstrate your own ignorance? What do you know, pray, of Tapanuli fever? What do you know of the black Formosa corruption?"

Much has been made of this, as commentators have tried to identify the disease Culverton Smith use to kill Savage and tried to use on Holmes from these descriptions, to match some real disease to Tapanuli fever or the black Formosa corruption.

But remember, at this point, Holmes was trying to fool Watson, and deliberately lying to him. He is trying to convince Watson that this is a case far outside his medical knowledge. Wouldn't it be just as likely that Holmes' might just make up some obscure disease names, to ensure that Watson wouldn't say, "Oh, yes, I saw a case of this when I was briefly in India!" (And if the cause of Savage's death had been mentioned in the newspapers, perhaps Watson would have familiarized himself with it, in case a case came into his practice!)

After all, the absolute best way to "prove someone's ignorance" to them is to make shit up...that way they can be guaranteed not to know!

**"I have learned so much during some recent researches which have a medico-criminal aspect."

Great. Now I want a whole season of Sherlock Quincy, Medical Examiner...

**Watson channeling Hamlet: "Of all ruins, that of a noble mind is the most deplorable."

**Inspector Morton, I hope you enjoy your cameo in the Canon!!

(Somewhat more seriously, I'm certain that Holmes went with this unknown inspector because the sight of one of Holmes' better-known police collaborators hanging about might have made Culverton Smith suspicious, had he been having Baker Street watched...)

**Doyle loves to play his villains as physically deformed, as if their evil is so vile that it must manifest in their appearance:

I saw a great yellow face, coarse-grained and greasy, with heavy, double-chin, and two sullen, menacing gray eyes which glared at me from under tufted and sandy brows. A high bald head had a small velvet smoking-cap poised coquettishly upon one side of its pink curve. The skull was of enormous capacity, and yet as I looked down I saw to my amazement that the figure of the man was small and frail, twisted in the shoulders and back like one who has suffered from rickets in his childhood.

**The villain Smith trying to draw a parallel between himself and Sherlock Holmes: "He is an amateur of crime, as I am of disease. For him the villain, for me the microbe."

**Smith: "There are my prisons," he continued, pointing to a row of bottles and jars which stood upon a side table. "Among those gelatine cultivations some of the very worst offenders in the world are now doing time."

Well, this wouldn't happen in 2015. A civilian household keeping a vast array of "biological weapons?" At the very least you could easily get a warrant now, based on Watson's description, and more likely you'd have Homeland Security and MI-5 and whatever all over the place in about 20 seconds.

**Holmes: "But I have reasons to suppose that this opinion would be very much more frank and valuable if he imagines that we are alone."

Yet still Watson doesn't get what's going on...

**Culverton Smith certainly has his villain smack talk down: "You can forget it or remember it, just as you like. I don't see you in the witnessbox. Quite another shaped box, my good Holmes, I assure you."

Man, we love to hate this guy. What a great villainous creation from Sir Arthur...

**Culverton Smith: "The fellow who came for me--I've forgotten his name--"

You forgot Watson's name? All right, now it's war!

**Holmes invents method acting: "The best way of successfully acting a part is to be it," said Holmes.

**Smith thinks that Holmes really doesn't have him:

"Now he will pretend, no doubt, that I have said anything which he may invent which will corroborate his insane suspicions. You can lie as you like, Holmes. My word is always as good as yours."

Smith obviously has a poor idea of the respect the police and courts have for Mr. Holmes' opinion, if he believes "my word is as good as yours."

**Of course, it's not down to just Holmes' word, as was the detective's plan all along.

But that begs a bit of the question: of how much value was Watson's word, in corroborating Holmes'?

After all, Watson was Holmes' former flatmate, and avowed friend. He also had a vested interest financial in Holmes' being right, given that he was writing up and publishing Holmes' adventures. A skilled defense barrister could really knock the stuffing out of any of Watson's testimony, on the grounds that he irretrievably biased in favor of the detective.

Throw in the notion that Watson was a medical man who had been thoroughly lied to and deceived by Holmes, and was unable to tell that Holmes was not ill, and the cross-examination of John Watson might not be a very pretty thing...

**I haven't designed many death-traps, but Culverton Smith's spring box seems like a very uncertain thing to me. How can you be sure that the intended victim opens it with his hands in the right position to receive the "sting?" How can you be certain that the skin is pierced, that blood is drawn? Or that your tropical disease withstands the rigors of being transported outside, during a chilly November, during a postal delivery?

The Granada adaptation used a more reasonable method---the box was full of tobacco, and sharp spikes lined the bottom, so when the victim reached in to fill his pipe, he would cut himself.

**"Malingering is a subject upon which I have sometimes thought of writing a monograph."

And it would of great use to those of us seeking to get out of work for a long weekend...

**Holmes as (justifiably) paranoid: "My correspondence, however, is, as you know, a varied one, and I am somewhat upon my guard against any packages which reach me."

I'm sure a 21st century Holmes would need radiation detectors, sniffer dogs, and who knows what else...

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE DISAPPEARANCE OF LADY FRANCES CARFAX

The Adventure Of The Bruce-Partington Plans--Victorian Spy Thriller!!

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 05 Jul 2015 12:00:00 +0000

The Adventure Of The Bruce-Partington plans is the third leg of an informal Sherlock Holmes trilogy.

Together with The Adventure of The Naval Treaty and The Adventure of The Second Stain, Bruce-Partington Plans tells a familiar story: a secret of vital importance to the British government is stolen. Holmes must recover it, lest the be devastating repercussions. And Holmes does succeed. They all follow the same outline.

By looking at these three stories, both the similarities and their differences, we can learn a fair amount about the state of espionage, and the quality of government security, back in the day.

First, I think it would help to have a brief recap of the stories. In The Naval Treaty, a "secret" treaty between England and Italy is stolen from the desk of a fool at the Foreign Office. The clerk promptly goes into a two month bout of "brain fever." When Holmes gets involved, he discovers that the culprit was the brother of the clerk's fiancee, who had large debts, who had stolen the document. Holmes thrashes him, and recovers the treaty.

In The Second Stain, an "imprudent" letter from a "foreign potentate" is stolen from the home of the European Minister, and seems certain to lead to war if it becomes public. Holmes discovers that it was taken by the minister's wife, who was being blackmailed by a spy over some indiscreet letters she wrote in her youth. Fortunately, the spy is murdered by his jealous wife, and the letter is recovered with nether war nor divorce.

In Bruce-Partington, top-secret plans for a new submarine are stolen, presumably by a clerk found murdered. It turns out that the brother of the department's head, who had large debts, had taken the plans and sold them to a spy. Fortunately, the spy was tricked into returning to England with the plans, and all was well that ended well (except for the poor murdered clerk!).

So what nuggets of wisdom can we tease out of these stories?

A) In all three mysteries, relatives (or soon-to-be relatives) steal the secrets. In Naval Treaty, the brother of Percy Phelps' fiance just strolls into Percy's office and takes a treaty that was sitting on top of the desk. In Second Stain, Trelawney Hope's wife is blackmailed into taking the letter for her husband's despatch box. And in Bruce-Partington, Sir James Walters' broke brother copied his keys and used them to steal England's most valuable military secret.

What can we take away from this? Family is trouble!

Or, to state it somewhat more seriously, a real weakness in any security system is when you relax your standards around the people you think that you should be able to trust the most.

In two of the stories, close family members were used by foreign agents to get access to what would otherwise be inaccessible. And in all three tales, personal weaknesses--debts and past (perceived) immoralities--led brother, brother-in-law (to be) and wife to violate family trust.

So don't be upset if you have a sensitive job and they run security checks on your loved ones. They're the ones most likely to betray you.

B) In all of the mysteries, ideology was not a motivating factor for the thefts.

This struck me as a bit surprising. Being weaned on WWII and Cold War thrillers, I've come to expect that at least some spies were true believers or fellow travelers, that they acted out of patriotism or the belief in some political/philosophical system.

But in Naval Treaty, Joseph Harrison is motivated simply by an opportunity to clear up investment debts. In Second Stain and Bruce-Partington, Lucas and Oberstein were seeking to auction off their ill-gotten secrets to the highest bidder.

Of course, international politics were different in the Victorian era, and competitions between states were less about competing ideological systems and more about national power. Still, it was surprising to see that no one in these stories was acting out of a particular antipathy for Britain or fondness for another country. It was all about the cash.

And watch out for those Stock Exchange investments. You'll lose your shirt, and have to turn to treason.

C) In all 3 mysteries, the security arrangements to protect these valuable secrets were woefully inadequate, if not criminally negligent.

In Naval Treaty, the Foreign Office has only one elderly commissionaire to watch the main entrance...and his main concern seems to be getting coffee for employees working late. Meanwhile, there is an unlocked, unguarded employees' side entrance, which leads directly to the offices and doesn't have to pass the commissionaire. Seriously--anyone can just walk in!! That has to be concerning, even if Phelps was negligent by leaving the treaty on his desktop and not locking his office door!!

In Second Stain, Trelawney Hope did not trust the governments' security, so he carried the letter with him in his locked despetch box...which he kept in an unlocked room at home, unguarded, because his family and servants were supposedly beyond suspicion.

In Bruce-Partington, Cadogan West complained that "that we were slack about such matters...that it would be easy for a traitor to get the plans." Indeed, there was only one watchman on the building--"but he has other departments to look after as well." And we learn that the shutters on the window don't even meet completely--so anyone can look into the safe room from the outside!! Granted, a thief would need to have three separate keys to pull off the crime. But once he got those, there was literally nothing left to protect England's most vital military secret!!!

Three huge secrets--each supposedly dangerous enough to lead to war--didn't have as much security as your average shopping mall shoe store!! Certainly, we can't expect advanced technology here, but how about real guards, on every entrance, 24/7?? Don't take earth-shattering documents home with you?

Given the level of government security shown in these stories, it's a wonder Britain had any secrets left to protect...

D) In two of the cases, both Holmes and the governments had lists of "known foreign spies and international agents."

Seriously, England just let these guys wander around?

I can understand the principle. It's better to have a spy you know about--so don't deport these guys immediately. Let them wander free and keep them under observation. Maybe they'll lead you to other operatives. Maybe you can use them against other governments, under the right circumstances. And if you kick them out, they'll be replaced, and you might not recognize who the new spies are until it's too late.

The problem, of course, is the all too familiar problem of departments not communicating with each other. In Bruce-Partington, Oberstein had been under some level of observation, and Mycroft's report said he had left town sometime after the plans were stolen. Well, you don't have to have a Sherlock-level intellect to figure out that when a major government secret is stolen, and the top foreign agent leaves London at the same time, there might be a connection. But no one in the government did make that connection. Three days later, apparently Oberstein's watchers still had no idea that anything untoward had happened, or that maybe they should kind of put out an urgent bulletin!

Given that level of intragovernmental cooperation, Britain would have been much better off rethinking the policy of just letting known spies wander around.

E) In two of the three stories, it was a diplomatic secret, not a military or technological one, that was stolen.

Again, this may seem a bit surprising to us--modern spy fiction is centered around stuff, gadgets and science and technology. Who goes around stealing letters from one monarch to another? Who thinks secret treaties (do they still have those?) are worth so much struggle?

A condition of our age is that those "diplomatic" secrets are leaked to the public fairly regularly--think Wikileaks, or Hillary's emails--and war never seems to be a terribly likely result. But military secrets, or intelligence methods? Now, that will get the NSA involved, and have people howling treason!!

We can certainly put some of this off to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle exaggerating for effect, or perhaps even ignorance, but the perception at the time seems to have been that diplomatic secrets were just as valuable and dangerous as military classified tech. It was believed that a poor choice of words from a potentate or word that two countries were talking was just as likely to set off a cataclysmic war as giving one side unbeatable naval superiority.

Of course, that was at least partially true, as contemporary European history was soon to prove.

F) In each of the mysteries, it was only blind luck that kept the secrets from falling into the wrong hands.

That's not to make light of Holmes' deductions and contributions. But consider that in Naval Treaty, it is only that fact that Joseph Harrison chose a particularly unlucky place to stash the treaty that kept it from being sold to a foreign power two months before Holmes became involved in the mystery. In Second Stain, if Lucas' wife doesn't choose that exact moment to show up and go into a jealous killing rage, the letter is in the hands of a foreign government before Holmes gets involved. And in Bruce-Partington, the plans have already left England!! It is only because Oberstein falls for a ruse--and brings the plans back with him to England--that disaster is averted.

In other words, having the world's greatest detective on your side is meaningless, because by the time you think to get him involved, it is already too late--unless your spies are ridiculously unlucky (and stupid).

So what can we learn through Sherlock Holmes' "spy" trilogy? Don't trust you're family. Don't invest in the stock market. Stop being so secretive and get the smartest man in the country involved more quickly. And for heaven's sake, England, if these secrets ask so damned important, invest in some decent security!!

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**You know, I have another suspect in this case: Sir James!!

I know, it's crazy. No, I don't seriously believe that.

But please consider this:

Sir James had access to the building and safe.
Sir James' alibi for the early part of the evening comes from his brother, Colonel Valentine, who will prove to be a very unreliable source: "Yes; his brother, Colonel Valentine Walter, has testified to his departure from Woolwich..."
We know Cadogan West saw someone he recognized in the fog that night and took off to follow him. But we never hear from his own lips whom that was, as West is inconveniently dead. It could have been James Walter, not his brother, could it not? And West's cryptic remarks to his fiancee--that security was slack, and that it would be east for a traitor to get the plans--could apply as well to Sir James as the colonel.

But Sir James died, you're probably saying. Well, perhaps. But Valentine is keen to tell us how sensitive James was about his honour. Suppose, just suppose, that Sir James felt that sting of dishonour over his brother's vast debts, which would shame the family. And Sir James decided to avoid that public shame by copying the plans and selling them. But West saw him, was killed, and that murder is the shame that killed Sir James?!?

Or, maybe he isn't dead. We never saw the body, and only have Colonel Walter's word on his death. They were in it together, and he was helping James fake his death, to escape with the profits for their endeavor. And when Valentine fell into Holmes' trap, he decided to take the heat homself to preserve his brother's name and freedom!

OK, not bloody likely.

**Still, it is legitimate to ask how Sir James did die.

His brother gives this explanation: "My brother, Sir James, was a man of very sensitive honour, and he could not survive such an affair. It broke his heart. He was always so proud of the efficiency of his department, and this was a crushing blow."

Oh, yes, the "he died of a broken heart!!" How very Amidala of him! (Of course, that type of death could be interpreted as a stress-induced stroke or heart attack...)

Holmes isn't completely sold on the cause of death, either: "I wonder if the death was natural, or whether the poor old fellow killed himself! If the latter, may it be taken as some sign of self-reproach for duty neglected?"

Of course, there is a third option--Colonel Walters killed his brother, when Sir James threatened to turn him in. The traitor had no qualms at betraying his nation and destroying his brother's reputation for a mere £5,000. That hardly makes you believe that he might stop at murder to preserve himself.

When you look at it in this light, the colonels statement that, "He said nothing, but he had caught me once with his keys, and I think that he suspected. I read in his eyes that he suspected. As you know, he never held up his head again" seems much more sinister, doesn't it?

Just putting that thought out there...

**Watson is no friend of the British Travel Bureau!

[W]e saw the greasy, heavy brown swirl still drifting past us and condensing in oily drops upon the window- panes...

Ah, that makes London sound so appetizing!!

**As the greasy, oily fog has Holmes and Watson trapped in Baker Street, Sherlock is "cross-indexing his huge book of references." Ah, to get my hands on that book!

Or, to have Sherlock able to do all that on a modern device. Holmes able to fit his entire library on an iPad?!? Someone get me a time machine...

**Sherlock's take on the sinister fog: "This great and sombre stage is set for something more worthy than [petty thefts]," said he. "It is fortunate for this community that I am not a criminal."

Oh, Sherlock, the way your mind works...

**Holmes: "It is well they don't have days of fog in the Latin countries--the countries of assassination."

Wait--does he mean Latin America? They do have fog there, right? And why are they particularly "the countries of assassination?" Some facts here, please, Sherlock!

**Hmm, a curious death, and Holmes isn't following the case in the papers? Watson has to be the keeper of this knowledge?! "There has been an inquest," said I, "and a good many fresh facts have come out. Looked at more closely, I should certainly say that it was a curious case."

One would think that, being so bored, Holmes would at least read about local inquests, if for no other reason than to criticize the coroners' decisions. That is how he became interested in The Black Peter case before Scotland Yard came to him.

**"No ticket! Dear me, Watson, this is really very singular. According to my experience it is not possible to reach the platform of a Metropolitan train without exhibiting one's ticket."
So they don't have turnstile jumpers and free-riders in Victorian England?!?

**So, if we are to believe Holmes--that he downplayed Mycroft's role in the government in the Greek Interpreter because he didn't fully trust Watson yet--can we trust Sherlock now as to Mycroft's job? Is he exaggerating to puff up his brother? Or to have a little fun at Watson's expense?

**Watson, playing up Mycroft's prodigious size:

A moment later the tall and portly form of Mycroft Holmes was ushered into the room. Heavily built and massive, there was a suggestion of uncouth physical inertia in the figure, but above this unwieldy frame there was perched a head so masterful in its brow, so alert in its steel-gray, deep-set eyes, so firm in its lips, and so subtle in its play of expression, that after the first glance one forgot the gross body and remembered only the dominant mind.

Watson is a bit obsessed about size. "Uncouth physical inertia"? "Gross body"? "Unwieldy frame"?? Tell us what you really think, John...

**When Mycroft arrives, he is shocked that John and Sherlock haven't heard of the Bruce-Partington submarine: "I thought everyone had heard of it." A few sentences later, Mycroft describes the craft as "the most jealously guarded of all Government secrets."

In the first Annotated Sherlock Holmes, William S. Baring-Gold suggests that those two statements can't be easily reconciled. Leslie Klinger, in the second Annotated Holmes, echoes the footnote.

Poppycock!! The secret is not the submarine's existence, it's the technical details of how it works!

Compare with the modern stealth bomber. It's not a secret. Everyone has heard about it! We've seen photographs!! But the technical details of how it works? That is what is top secret.

**Mycroft declare that there are "thirty separate patents, each essential to the working of the whole..." Of course, by the time he's done with his briefing, we're down to needing only 3 of the blueprints to make the device work. If all 30 are essential, Walter and Oberstein wouldn't have limited themselves to just 3!!

(And yes, we're later told by the clerk that maybe you need 4 things, and in fact that is what draws Oberstein back to England. 4 is still a far stretch from all 30 being essential, though...)

**Mycroft the lazy:

Possibly, Sherlock. But it is a question of getting details. Give me your details, and from an armchair I will return you an excellent expert opinion. But to run here and run there, to cross-question railway guards, and lie on my face with a lens to my eye--it is not my metier.

**Holmes on the possibly of being knighted: "I play the game for the game's own sake..."

**He won't get credit for it, but Lestrade's reasoning is fairly sound:

"It seems to me perfectly clear," said Lestrade. "I have no doubt at all as to what occurred. He took the papers to sell them. He saw the agent. They could not agree as to price. He started home again, but the agent went with him. In the train the agent murdered him, took the more essential papers, and threw his body from the carriage. That would account for everything, would it not?"

"Why had he no ticket?"

"The ticket would have shown which station was nearest the agent's house. Therefore he took it from the murdered man's pocket."

"Good, Lestrade, very good," said Holmes. "Your theory holds together.

His theory turned out to be wrong, but it fit the facts they had at the time. And much better than the usual theories of the crime that Lestrade would come up with and stubbornly stick to!!

**Understatement of the Canon: "It was one of my friend's most obvious weaknesses that he was impatient with less alert intelligences than his own."

**Watson watching Holmes become alert and on the hunt:

His eager face still wore that expression of intense and high- strung energy, which showed me that some novel and suggestive circumstance had opened up a stimulating line of thought. See the foxhound with hanging ears and drooping tail as it lolls about the kennels, and compare it with the same hound as, with gleaming eyes and straining muscles, it runs upon a breast-high scent--such was the change in Holmes since the morning. He was a different man from the limp and lounging figure in the mouse- coloured dressing-gown who had prowled so restlessly only a few hours before round the fog-girt room

"Fog-girt"? Wonderful stuff, Doyle!

**Holmes is shocked that, while right on the crime, he was wrong on the criminal: "Holmes gave a whistle of surprise. 'You can write me down an ass this time, Watson," said he. "This was not the bird that I was looking for.'"

We're not told whom Holmes thought the criminal was. The only other viable suspect we meet is Sydney Johnson, the senior clerk and West's superior (unless, of course, you buy my "Sir James did it" theory above...).

Still, there is nothing in particular to make us suspect Johnson. He's only in one scene, and has very little dialogue. He says and does nothing to make us suspicious of him. There's really nothing there, at least on the page.

Obviously, given Holmes' surprise at the colonel showing up at the ambush, he must have suspected Johnson. Sir Arthur needed to do a better job of making us suspect him, as well.

**Mycroft: "The whole force of the State is at your back if you should need it."

Thus, Holmes is emboldened to bend the laws on their urgent quest:

"Could we not get a warrant and legalize it?"

"Hardly on the evidence...It's not a time to stick at trifles. Think of Mycroft's note, of the Admiralty, the Cabinet, the exalted person who waits for news. We are bound to go.

Contrast with Lestrade's disapproval of Sherlock and John's breaking and entering:

"We can't do these things in the force, Mr. Holmes," said he. "No wonder you get results that are beyond us. But some of these days you'll go too far, and you'll find yourself and your friend in trouble."

"For England, home and beauty--eh, Watson? Martyrs on the altar of our country.

That makes for a pretty good encapsulation of the arguments on whether or not legal niceties and civil rights can be set aside in a time of crisis.

In other cases, Holmes (and Watson) acknowledged the potential dire legal repercussions should they be caught in burglary, and kept the police in the dark on such activities. Here, though, Holmes openly admits to law-breaking in front of Lestrade. In this case, he is working not as a private citizen, but as a de facto agent of the state. No doubt the certainty that the whole power of the Home Office, and the Queen herself, would step in to protect him against prosecution emboldened him to speak openly in front of the police.

Score a point again for Lestrade, though, for noting that civilian status left Holmes less bound by laws and regulations than the police--"no wonder you get results that are beyond us." Meow!!

**Holmes: "I will do nothing serious without my trusted comrade and biographer at my elbow." Of course, there were plenty of times when you have done so, Sherlock...

**So, why did Oberstein leave copies of the personal ads lying about? He seemed to have destroyed all of the other evidence. Did he forget about them? Was he planning to use them and come back to blackmail Valentine later? It seems unbelievable sloppy (and lucky for Holmes).

**Holmes upbraiding the colonel: "How English gentleman could behave in such a manner is beyond my comprehension."

Oh, Sherlock, you've seen many gentleman (especially colonels!!) do this and far worse!! Has he forgotten? Or was he just trying to shame a confession out of Walters?

**Many have questioned Watson's account that Oberstein received only a 15 year sentence for espionage and murder.

I think that the murder charge is perhaps not so certain as many think. A case can be made out for manslaughter.

Valentine tells us, "As West forced his way after us into the house Oberstein struck him on the head." The colonel is certainly not an unbiased observer. But if West were trying to force his way into Oberstein's home, you can make the argument that he was justified in his use of force. I'm no expert on the law of the day, but West is described earlier as "hot-headed," and he could be portrayed as the aggressor in this fight.

The Granada adaptation removes all doubt about it being manslaughter. Oberstein does not use a "life-preserver," and West merely falls and hits his head on the ground during a scuffle.

Of course, Oberstein may also have given all sorts of information to the government in exchange for a lighter sentence. I imagine he had a tale or two to tell...

**Oberstein "came to the lure and was safely engulfed...In his trunk were found the invaluable Bruce-Partington plans, which he had put up for auction in all the naval centres of Europe."

Why in heaven's name bring them back to England with you!?!

I can understand not wanting to leave them behind, in France or wherever. If some other spies find them, you lose your big payday.

But bringing them back into England ensures that you will be convicted if you're caught!! Surely there must have been some safe drop box you could have left them in, some unsuspected hiding place!!

**Finally, it should be noted that, despite Mycroft's histrionics, obviously naval warfare did NOT become obsolete because of Bruce-Partington submarines.

Whether the invention turned out to be a failure, or other nations developed their own versions, or military strategists devised counter-measures, all the sturm und drang turned out to be for nothing.

As Spock said, "Military secrets are the most fleeting of all."

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE DYING DETECTIVE!!

The Adventure Of The Red Circle--In Which I Am Hoist On My Own Petard!

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 28 Jun 2015 12:00:00 +0000

I guess this is my own fault.

After all, I wrote at great length in my pieces on A Study In Scarlet and The Valley Of Fear of my disdain for the novella-length digressions in the stories. Did we really need 6 or 7 chapters of background to truly understand the background and motives of our killer and/or victims?

Which brings us to The Adventure Of The Red Circle.

Now here is a story which could have used a few more lines explaining exactly what was going on.

Don't get me wrong--Red Circle is a fine story, a good Holmes mystery. It is a story, however, where some of the answers seem to come a bit too easily, and without proper explanation.

Now, part of this is because of the story's structure. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle has Holmes drawn into the mystery because of a landlady who is creeped out by an unusual border, which leads to the much more serious case.

It's a clever conceit. But the problem is, as a result, we never meet Gennaro Lucca, and we never meet Guiseppe Gorgiano. The killer and the victim are known to Holmes and Watson only third-hand (and therefore to the reader only fourth-hand!), the story told by in patches by people who only know parts of the story. And considering that the largest parcel of background comes from Emilia, who is hardly unbiased, we get a very haphazard and distorted look at the entire story.

As a result, we're left with definite gaps in the story. The reader is left with no idea what actually happened at keys points in the tale, of how certain characters got from point A to point B.

Now, these are not "plot holes" in the sense that "Hey, this thing couldn't have happened!" Most of the questions Red Circle leaves us with can be fairly easily answered, at least potentially so, with a teeny bit of imaginative elbow-grease. But should the reader have to do so much of the heavy lifting for themselves? Especially when a couple of sentences or paragraphs, or even the use of Gennaro himself in the story, could have cleared so much up?

Amongst the more fundamental questions he have:

A) What, exactly, was Gennaro doing in London for 10 days?

Mrs. Warren states that her mysterious lodger had been there for 10 days when the story begins, and it continues the next day. That's 11 days, and we know that for ten of those, it was really Emilia in the room.

So what, exactly, was occupying Gennaro all that time?

Emilia tells us that "he wished to be free that he might communicate both with the American and with the Italian police." But we're never given an explanation of why he's communicating with them, especially the Italians.

Communicating with American police may make sense...he left them evidence against Gorgiano before he fled. He could be giving them more information. Or he could be following up on the status of their hunt for Gorgiano. He might even be working on some kind of immunity deal in exchange for testifying against the other members of the Red Circle.

But why communicate with the Italian police? Well, Gennaro was a "sworn" member of the Red Circle in Italy before he left for the United States. Perhaps he was trying to ascertain his legal status, to see if he and his wife could return. Perhaps he was also trying for immunity in exchange for evidence in his homeland.

Still, even in the pre-international telephone era, why was this taking 11 days?!? What else was he doing with his time? And why, if he was so certain the red Circle would be pursuing him, didn't he contact the British police?!?

B) How innocent was Gennaro?

When he met Emilia, she believed that he "had neither money nor position." But we know from his later confession to her that he even then a member of the Red Circle, and the "secrets of this brotherhood were frightful." Who knows what crimes Gennaro had already committed by the time he and Emilia had fled to America?

Gennaro was drawn--forced?--back into the Red Circle in America. Emilia's tale is vague, and we can't really tell how long Gennaro was a participant--days? Weeks? Months? During that time, how many "rich Italians" had fallen prey to the Circle's extortion and violence? It wasn't until Gorgiano assaulted his wife and threatened his benefactor that Gennaro decided to inform the police and flee. How many other crimes did he carry at least partial responsibility for?

And did his benefactor even survive? Emilia tells us that Gennaro "had given our benefactor full warning of this danger, and had also left such information for the police as would safeguard his life for the future."

The clear implication of this is that Castalotte survived. Yet this is only the version of events told to Emilia, by her possibly guilty husband. The Granada adaptation comes right out and says that Castalotte and his invalid partner were murdered by Gorgiano! So Gennaro's warning to the police and Castalotte failed--if it was even given.

Again, this is all very difficult to evaluate, as Sir Arthur doesn't make Gennaro present in the story for even one moment. We have nothing to judge him by except the testimony off his terrified wife--and much of that information is merely tales that she wasn't even a witness to herself!

Was Gennaro involved in the Red Circle to a much greater degree than he let his wife know? Is that the reason for the two weeks of negotiations with American and Italian police? And could it be that his killing of Gorgiano is not the self-defense Emilia would have us believe? We can never truly know...

C) Who exactly was Leverton of the Pinkerton Agency working for?

The Pinkertons, although a private detective agency, did do work for the government. Indeed, until 1893, the U.S. Department Of Justice essentially outsourced "the detection and prosecution of those guilty of violating federal law" to the Pinkertons. So, depending on when you date this story, the Pinkertons could be working for the federal government in tracking down Gennaro. And even after that date, they still could have been employed by state or local governments who lacked the resources to pursue felons fleeing to Europe.

Yet, if Leverton was fulfilling a government mission, why did he have absolutely no idea about Gennaro and his wife? Lucca (supposedly) informed the authorities of Gorgiano's operations, and currently was in contact with the American police. Why, then, did Leverton know nothing of him? For someone who "KNOWS" of fifty murders that Gorgiano is responsible for, he seems oddly uninformed about the (attempted?) murder that led the ruffian to run to England.

Of course, the Pinkertons also did lots of private work, often for large businesses. Did some of the businesses victimized by the Red Circle's protection racket hire the Pinkertons to do what the police could not--find Gorgiano and put a stop to him? Castalotte, even, if he survived?

Or perhaps Leverton was just working on his own, seeking the reward for himself...

D) How in the hell did Gorgiano find Mrs. Warren's boarding house?

Let's review our timeline. On Day 1, Gennaro and Emilia arrive in England, with a "few clear days which our start had given us" ahead of Black Gorgiano. In the evening, they make their switch--Emilia goes into the boarding house, and Gennaro never returns there.

That's how security conscious they were--Gennaro didn't even trust letters being delivered there. Emilia never left the room. They communicated through ads in the "agony" column--but there was never anything there to indicate where Emilia was.

So how did Gorgiano find her dwelling?

We can guess easily enough how they found Gennaro. Maybe some Mafia thugs just spotted him tooling around London. [PRO-TIP: when the first thing anyone describes about you is your thick black beard, you might want to shave that off if you want to be incognito.] Gennaro was also in touch with police in New York and Italy, and as this is the Mafia we're dealing with, it's certainly possible that some bent coppers passed information to Gorgiano, such as the time his cables were sent, etc.

But that doesn't explain why two Italian gentleman turned up watching the boarding house, as Gennaro wasn't there, and there was nothing to indicate that he was. He hadn't been there in days, long before Gorgiano arrived! (Or had he? Certainly he wanted to keep tabs on Emilia, so perhaps he had the bad habit of hanging around, On The Street Where You Live style, and was spotted? That would prove Gennaro considerably dimmer than Holmes supposed, as "The man cannot come near the woman, or he will guide their enemies to her.")

And if they did think that he was staying there, why did the goons wait eleven days--11!!--to try to snatch him?!? Surely, this wasn't the first time Mr. Warren left the house, was it? Why wait so long?

And then, somehow, at the end, the Red Circle figured that Gennaro was in his hidey hole in the house on Howe Street. How? Surely, even if they recognized his messages in the personal ads, they couldn't narrow down his location from "High red house with stone facings."Again, did they find him by chance and follow him? Why was all of their attention focused on this block to begin with?

In the Granada version, it was an Italian immigrant who took a special interest in helping his countrymen who sent Gennaro to that boarding boarding house. Gorgiano went to him, and tortured the information out of him. Certainly something of the kind could have happened here: they torture the man, he gives them the location, they kidnap the wrong fellow, but figure that Gennaro must be close by, and spot him going into the signal house. But Doyle gives us absolutely no indication that this is what occurred...

E) Where the hell did Gennaro go?

He warns Emilia by signal of grave danger. he is attacked by Black Gorgiano, whom he kills in self-defense. And then...he vanishes!!

You would think that his first instinct would be to head for the boarding house, to make sure that Emilia was safe. Or when he saw her in Scotland Yard custody, he would rush in, declaring her innocence, taking all the heat himself, etc.

Yet there's not a trace of him. Was he wounded in the fight, perhaps even dying somewhere hidden? Gorgiano had at least two confederates--what happened to them? Did Gennaro fall prey to them? Did he know that his killing of Gorgiano wasn't really self-defense, so he fled?

Of course, Holmes could have suggested putting ads in the Daily Gazette's agony column, or perhaps sending candle singles in cipher from Emilia's windows. But he was too eager to go to the opera.

As I said, all of these questions are fairly easily answerable. It's just that Sir Arthur didn't seem all that interested in providing us these answers. Despite Holmes' paeans to "education" and "seeking knowledge," he doesn't seem particularly interested in seeking that knowledge here. Despite saying, "and yet one would wish to tidy it up," he does absolutely no tidying. Nor does Watson seem concerned. Is Gennaro ever found? How does the trial come out? What happens to the couple? What happens to the Red Circle members still at large? The mystery may be over, but the story isn't, and the audience is frustrated by the lack of closure.

So, unlike my criticism of a couple of the Holmes novels, this is a case where I wish Sir Arthur had given us just a little bit more information to work with. Not chapters' worth--but an additional paragraph here or there could have easily addressed the concerns.

So, my bad. Sorry. I shouldn't have said that Sir Arthur needed to wrap up this type of story more quickly. Mea culpa.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**Once again Holmes claims to be too busy to deal with a new client. This time, however, it really is very insulting:

"...nor do I understand why I, whose time is of some value, should interfere in the matter. I really have other things to engage me." So spoke Sherlock Holmes and turned back to the great scrapbook in which he was arranging and indexing some of his recent material.

Sorry, ma'am, your troubles aren't as important as my scrapbooking. Sheesh.

**Apocryphal case alert: "You arranged an affair for a lodger of mine last year," she said--"Mr. Fairdale Hobbs." "Ah, yes--a simple matter."

**Mrs. Warren seems a bit high-strung to be a landlady, no?

Granted, her mysterious tenant's behavior is a bit unusual. But "I can't sleep for fright"? Really? "To hear his quick step moving here and moving there from early morning to late at night, and yet never to catch so much as a glimpse of him--it's more than I can stand"? "It's more than my nerves can stand"? "This is out of all reason"?

Yes, it did turn out to be a fairly serious matter. But at this point, it's nothing more than eccentricity, and the landlady acts as if Freddy Krueger is staying in her house!! On can only imagine how upset she would be if she had a boarder who was actually troublesome...

**You could rent a room without giving your name, or references? Those were the days, I guess. He did pay cash in advance. But just try to get a room somewhere today without a credit check and ID, and see how far you get...

**Gennaro, on the £10 he handed the landlady: "You can have the same every fortnight for a long time to come if you keep the terms."

"For a long time to come? How long, exactly, was Lucca planning on having his wife holed up there? Or was he lying, and just using the prospect of a long-term payday to entice Mrs. Warren to agree to his terms?

**Give credit to Mrs. Warren: bringing the notes, matches and cigarette stubs along with her was good thinking, and showed she had a healthy understanding of Sherlock's capabilities.

**Holmes on the doctor's facial hair: "Why, Watson, even your modest moustache would have been singed."

So Watson has a "modest" soup-strainer? Of course, a "modest" moustache by Victorian standards was likely pretty large by our standards...

**Holmes to Mrs. Warren, outlining his view on privacy:

After all, you have nothing to complain of. You have received your rent, and he is not a troublesome lodger, though he is certainly an unusual one. He pays you well, and if he chooses to lie concealed it is no direct business of yours. We have no excuse for an intrusion upon his privacy until we have some reason to think that there is a guilty reason for it.

So this is the limit to Holmes' desire to snoop: if you're not hurting anyone and not breaking a law, you can do as you will...that sounds like a lesson certain lawmakers and busybodies need to learn.

**Holmes on newspaper "agony columns":

"Dear me!" said he, turning over the pages, "what a chorus of groans, cries, and bleatings! What a rag-bag of singular happenings! But surely the most valuable hunting-ground that ever was given to a student of the unusual!...Bleat, Watson-- unmitigated bleat!

Of course, if this story took place today, there would be no shortage of ways for Gennaro to contact Emilia privately (not to mention the "lady with a black boa at Prince's Skating Club," "Jimmy," or "the lady who fainted on the Brixton bus.") Twitter, Facebook, email, Skype...not to mention just having cell phones!

But as we've discussed, "back in the day" newspaper personal columns were probably the only way to reach a mass audience cheaply and relatively clandestinely. You could try telegrams, but no doubt Gorgiano's men were watching such places.

Then again, if they found Gennaro's messages--perhaps a bit of a leap, as they would have to figure out which newspaper, and then which messages were from him--they might have posted someone to watch the newspaper offices...could that be how they found Gennaro, when he went to place his personal ads?

**Publishing the key to your cipher in the personal ad was pretty stupid. Seriously.

"The path is clearing. If I find chance signal message remember code agreed--One A, two B, and so on. You will hear soon. G."

Are we to believe that Emilia could not remember this simple children's cipher without having to tell it to the entire world? And why risk your enemies finding it?!?

**Deductive reasoning from amateurs:"

"And you connect this attack with your lodger?"
"Well, we've lived there fifteen years and no such happenings ever came before."

Oh, Mrs. Warren, correlation does not equal causation...Still, she was right. Perhaps she would have made a fine detective, if her nerves were better...

**Much has been made of the cipher used, because the Italian alphabet, according to many, has no J and no K (not to mention no W, X or Y):

Now, Holmes did not know initially that the coded message was in Italian; he didn't figure that out after the first word was repeated three times. Therefore, the argument goes, his translation of every letter after I should have been off by two letters! T wouldn't be the twentieth letter! ATTENTA, should have been read by Holmes as AVVEPVA!

But perhaps it's not as clear cut as that. Italian, like most other languages, absorbs foreign words, and sometimes that requires adopting other letters, as well. Note this chart:

The J, K, etc, are presented as additional letters, adjuncts to the "regular" alphabet!! How else can you talk about koalas wearing jeans whilst using walkie-talkies on their yachts?

Some charts even work those letters into the Italian alphabet in our familiar English order:

I'm certainly not enough of a historical linguist to know if these letters were known, let alone accepted and integrated, to the Italian alphabet in the 1890s. But this is not as cut-and-dried example of a Doyle error as many portray it...

**Meanwhile, if Emilia's English was good enough to understand English-language personal ads, why not use English for your cipher messages conducted via candle flash? Indeed, since you're being tracked by Italians, it seems more reasonable to give your warnings in English.

**Holmes:"Ah, yes, Watson--severely practical, as usual!"

Hmm, usually Holmes chides Watson as being unpractical, and fanciful, and sentimental. One suspects that his "severely practical" here might be slightly sarcastic!!

**When Holmes has the solved the outlines of the mystery, Watson wants to know why he continues with the case:

"Why should you go further in it? What have you to gain from it?"

"What, indeed? It is art for art's sake, Watson. I suppose when you doctored you found yourself studying cases without thought of a fee?"

"For my education, Holmes."

"Education never ends, Watson. It is a series of lessons with the greatest for the last. This is an instructive case. There is neither money nor credit in it, and yet one would wish to tidy it up.

That's a nice thought, from a man who initially rejected the case because he would rather cut and paste newspaper articles!

**Gregson!! "Journeys end with lovers' meetings." Sadly, this will be our last case with the Inspector.

**Wait, a Scotland Yard inspector AND a top Pinkerton agent are staking out the house--but they never noticed the signals? And heard no sounds from what must have been a death struggle from a room facing the street? Certainly, this was not Gregson's finest hour.

**Holmes praises Leverton as "the hero of The Long Island cave mystery."

Some have cited this as an error, as there are apparently no caves in Long Island.

This is perhaps technically true, but modern news stories tell us that "at least a half-dozen large caves within a day's drive of Long Island are open to the public." It wouldn't surprising that some caves near Long Island earned the mystery its title.

Also, there are plenty of Long Islands around besides the most famous one in New York. That include Long Island in the Bahamas, which apparently has an extensive system of caves. It's not hard to image Leverton chasing down some miscreant there.

And of course, it could just be an ironically named mystery:

Holmes: He's the hero of the Long Island Cave Mystery!
Watson: But there are no caves in Long Island!!
Holmes: Precisely! That is the mystery!!

**Gregson, it turns out, would have made a fine rule-breaking American detective:

Leverton:"What do you suggest, Mr. Holmes?"

Holmes: "That we go up at once and see for ourselves."

Leverton: "But we have no warrant for his arrest."

Gregson: "He is in unoccupied premises under suspicious circumstances," said Gregson. "That is good enough for the moment. When we have him by the heels we can see if New York can't help us to keep him. I'll take the responsibility of arresting him now."

Ah, the equivalent of pulling over someone suspicious looking for a broken tail light!

Gregson would fit right in on an episode of (American) Law & Order!

**Watson, on the virtues of the English police:

Our official detectives may blunder in the matter of intelligence, but never in that of courage. Gregson climbed the stair to arrest this desperate murderer with the same absolutely quiet and businesslike bearing with which he would have ascended the official staircase of Scotland Yard. The Pinkerton man had tried to push past him, but Gregson had firmly elbowed him back. London dangers were the privilege of the London force.

Scotland Yard: dumb but brave!! Sheesh, no matter so many felt ill at ease working with Sherlock--Watson did a great job by himself of publicly disparaging them!

**Emilia, upon seeing Gorgiano's bloody body:

Then I heard a sudden sharp intake of her breath, and she sprang into the air with a cry of joy. Round and round the room she danced, her hands clapping, her dark eyes gleaming with delighted wonder, and a thousand pretty Italian exclamations pouring from her lips. It was terrible and amazing to see such a woman so convulsed with joy at such a sight.

Terrible and amazing is right, doctor.

Not the the sudden relief from months of terror won't make you do funny things...but really, this is kind of behavior that makes you and your husband look guilty in the eyes of the police!

**Emilia: "But once as I looked through my window, I saw two Italians watching the house, and I understood that in some way Gorgiano had found our retreat."

So, how did she know they were Italian? Some style of dress or hair that only Italians wore, and no one else in England?

**Once again, foreign quarrels settled on British soil. It's well past motif, and even beyond cliche at this point.

I mean, c'mon, can't British citizens commit crime against other British citizens anymore? Or perhaps all of the stories are representative (perhaps subconsciously) of an English xenophobia of the era--"all foreigners are trouble!"

**This is the most closure we get from this story:

"I don't know what your British point of view may be, but I guess that in New York this lady's husband will receive a pretty general vote of thanks." "She will have to come with me and see the chief," Gregson answered. "If what she says is corroborated, I do not think she or her husband has much to fear.

At least The Valley Of Fear gave us a sentence telling us the outcome of the self-defense trial. C'mon, Sir Arthur, don't leave us hanging for over a century!!

**Holmes: "By the way, it is not eight o'clock, and a Wagner night at Covent Garden! If we hurry, we might be in time for the second act."

Or, you could find Gennaro, find the other Red Circle members, and actually finish the case...

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE BRUCE-PARTINGTON PLANS!!

The Adventure Of Wisteria Lodge--Just One More Thing, Sir!

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 14 Jun 2015 12:00:00 +0000

The Adventure Of Wisteria Lodge leaves me lukewarm, for a number of reasons.

The first is that our heroes seem terribly detached from anything in the mystery.

An interesting client, Mr. Scott Eccles, comes to Baker Street with a quandary. The police burst in, wishing to question him, as it turns out that quandary has evolved into...a murder!! And as Scotland Yard leads him away for a formal statement, Scott Eccles declares, "Certainly, I will come at once. But I retain your services, Mr. Holmes. I desire you to spare no expense and no pains to get at the truth."

We never hear from him again. He may be the client, but Holmes and Watson seem to feel no obligation to communicate at all with him after this.

We never meet the victim while he's alive--not so unusual in a mystery short story, after all. But we never meet the killer, either--Holmes apparently has a brief conversation with him, off-screen as it were, but Watson is never in his presence, so neither are we. There is no battle of wits, just a description of a guy who may or may not be involved.

After "day succeeded day," we're really no closer to solving the mystery. Sherlock has no idea who Henderson really is, and no evidence to justify any action. It seems likely that Holmes' inactivity would continue, were it not for his certainty that a woman was being held captive.

So, we're ready for some positive action, finally--a break-in, with the threat of arrest and disgrace awaiting our heroes. And then...the house is empty, everyone has left! No confrontation, no stealth rescue...nothing. Holmes and Watson never even leave their room!

Well, surely, they rescue the lady? Uh...nope. That's done by a character we haven't met yet, off-screen: "They've gone, Mr. Holmes. They went by the last train.The lady broke away, and I've got her in a cab downstairs."

Oh, OK, then.

It almost seems as if Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is deliberately trying to tease us in this story. We have an interesting premise for a mystery. He he quickly removes the client, never shows us the victim, never has us meet the villains, and has our heroes uninvolved in rescuing the damsel. The villains even get away scot-free! What the hell kind of Sherlock Holmes story is this? And don't get me started on the offensive racial stuff...

So there's one thing, and one thing only, that makes Wisteria Lodge particularly noteworthy: Inspector Baynes.

What an interesting creation!! At last, a police detective who is a worthy challenger for Sherlock Holmes!! One who is not a dolt, who has the imagination that Holmes so often demands, one who implement plots as clever as the Great Detective!

Baynes doesn't sound like much, based on Watson's initial description, except for one crucial detail: "The country detective was a stout, puffy, red man, whose face was only redeemed from grossness by two extraordinarily bright eyes, almost hidden behind the heavy creases of cheek and brow."

Ah, the smart fat man. A Nero Wolfe, a Frank Cannon, a Fatman with no Jake! And you can tell how smart he is, because Watson never brings up the "grossness" again, instead focusing on Baynes' demeanor and intelligence.

I'll admit, that same demeanor had me thinking of TV's Lt. Columbo. The detective who doesn't look like much of a threat, the polite mien, the deferential attitude to those who think themselves superior while making the slow and steady progress, solving the case despite people taking him too lightly.

Most amazing is the instant respect that he and Holmes seem to have for each other. Other inspectors we've might might have bristled when Holmes declared that they had missed some clues. Not Baynes: "The country detective chuckled. 'I thought I had squeezed all the juice out of it, but I see there was a little over,' he said." No jealousy or resentment, as you'd get from many a pompous Scotland Yard git, but a verbal bow of respect!

And it is a mutual admiration society, as Holmes congratulates Baynes: "I must congratulate you, Inspector, on handling so distinctive and instructive a case. Your powers, if I may say so without offence, seem superior to your opportunities." High praise, indeed, from the bedeviller of police detectives!

Most interest is the little competition the two detectives set up between themselves:

"You have a theory then?"

"And I'll work it myself, Mr. Holmes. It's only due to my own credit to do so. Your name is made, but I have still to make mine. I should be glad to be able to say afterwards that I had solved it without your help."

Holmes laughed good-humoredly. "Well, well, Inspector," said he. "Do you follow your path and I will follow mine. My results are always very much at your service if you care to apply to me for them.

It's a competition that Baynes wins handily, in my opinion. The country detective is the one who comes up with the Holmes-like plan to capture the missing chef, and succeeds. Yet Holmes doesn't see it:

"I have looked into this case with some care, and I am not convinced that you are on the right lines. I don't want you to commit yourself too far unless you are sure."

"You're very kind, Mr. Holmes."

"I assure you I speak for your good." It seemed to me that something like a wink quivered for an instant over one of Mr. Baynes's tiny eyes. "We agreed to work on our own lines, Mr. Holmes. That's what I am doing."

"Oh, very good," said Holmes. "Don't blame me."

"No, sir; I believe you mean well by me. But we all have our own systems, Mr. Holmes. You have yours, and maybe I have mine."

"And you think you have evidence that he murdered his late master?"

"I didn't say so, Mr. Holmes; I didn't say so. We all have our little ways. You try yours and I will try mine. That's the agreement."

Holmes shrugged his shoulders as we walked away together. "I can't make the man out. He seems to be riding for a fall. Well, as he says, we must each try our own way and see what comes of it. But there's something in Inspector Baynes which I can't quite understand."

It's interesting that Holmes can't see his own methods in another detective,and doesn't realize that the trap for the chef was really a trap for the true villain.

Baynes also figures out that High Gable is the source of all the mischief, apparently at the same time as Holmes. And while Holmes' hireling manages to rescue the girl (without Sherlock's knowledge, or help), Baynes is the one who figures out that Henderson's true identity is Don Murillo. Exactly how he manages to do that is unexplained--but the country detective somehow has traced all of the ex-dictator's movements since his exile!! All Holmes managed during this time was to look up some information on voodoo that was completely irrelevant to the case.

No, it's a solid victory for Baynes her, as Holmes manfully acknowledges: Holmes laid his hand upon the inspector's shoulder. "You will rise high in your profession. You have instinct and intuition," said he. Baynes flushed with pleasure.

One fascinating detail is how much Baynes' prospects have been limited by his posting in Surrey. Despite Sherlock telling us how much scarier the countryside is in The Copper Beeches, it seems that there's not enough spectacular crime in rural areas for a police detective to get noticed and advance: Inspector Baynes's small eyes twinkled with pleasure. "You're right, Mr. Holmes. We stagnate in the provinces. A case of this sort gives a man a chance, and I hope that I shall take it." That puts a copper in the absurd position of almost rooting for sensational murders to solve.

Yet it's not as if Baynes' became smart overnight--he obviously was always this smart. But his tame beat, and no doubt partially his looks, kept him from bigger things. No wonder he latched onto this opportunity, and refused to take help from Holmes. This might have been his only real chance to prove himself! A spotlight murder, the attention of Scotland Yard, the esteem that would come when colleagues learned he had solved a case better than the great Sherlock Holmes...this was his chance to get out of the "minor leagues," and he was taking it!

Why, oh why, did we never see Baynes again? He is so much more interesting than most of the other police that Holmes has worked with!

I suppose that it would be a too difficult a balancing act to pull off much more often: A detective as smart (or smarter) than Holmes? How would that sell, when one of the reasons people love Sherlock Holmes is they love to see the "civilian" sticking it too stuffy bureaucratic "official" police? And how, in a short story, do you provide many cases that can equally challenge both men, without making one or the other look the sidekick? Two smart detectives might spoil the broth, as it were.

But in a story where Doyle seems to be doing everything possible to distance the readers, Inspector Baynes stands out. It's too bad that he was destined to become Doyle's forgotten detective.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**"How do you define the word 'grotesque'?" "Strange--remarkable," I suggested. He shook his head at my definition. "There is surely something more than that," said he; "some underlying suggestion of the tragic and the terrible."

Perhaps. But the examples he goes on to cite as having started as "grotesque at the outset...yet deepened into the criminal"--The Red-Headed League, or the Five Orange Pips--weren't particularly tragic or terrible, especially poor Jabez Wilson. Baffling? Perhaps? Odd? Sure. But grotesque?

Most modern definitions of the word include the concept of something "repulsive" or "distorted" or "unnatural." One might think that The Hound Of The Baskervilles, or The Speckled Band, might be more accurately be described as "grotesque."

Then again, perhaps our use of the word has shifted somewhat since the early 20th century...

**Is Holmes jabbing Watson with his "Watson, we must look upon you as a man of letters..."? He does, after all, preface it with "I suppose." And he immediately disagree with Watson on the one thing he need a man of letters for...

**Accurate observation of gender differences by Holmes, or sexism? "Oh, man, of course. No woman would ever send a reply-paid telegram. She would have come."

**Apocryphal case: "you know how bored I have been since we locked up Colonel Carruthers."

Another evil colonel. What is it that turns so many colonels evil (at least in the Canon)? Frustration at not being able to move up any higher?!?

**Watson making Holmes-worthy deductions:

His life history was written in his heavy features and pompous manner. From his spats to his gold-rimmed spectacles he was a Conservative, a churchman, a good citizen, orthodox and conventional to the last degree.

Not the hardest or deepest deductions in the world, of course. But it shows that Watson does, indeed, know his flatmate's methods.

**Maybe insulting a guy before you hire him is bad form...

Private detectives are a class with whom I have absolutely no sympathy, but none the less, having heard your name--"

No wonder Sherlock never got back to him in the story...

**"Come, come, sir," said Holmes, laughing. "You are like my friend, Dr. Watson, who has a bad habit of telling his stories wrong end foremost."

So, what end should they be written from? From the solution backwards?!?

Unless, of course, Sherlock is critiquing the massive historical digression in A Study In Scarlet (and later in The Valley Of Fear). In which case we agree, putting 60 pages of flashback at the end of your mystery is indeed "telling stories with the wrong end foremost."

**Look!! It's Inspector Gregson!! He vanishes very quickly, though...Did we really need him to make the introduction of Baynes?

**The "police burst in wanting to question someone just as they're about to tell Holmes his story" shtick is, of course, a reprise from The Norwood Builder:

"Wait a bit, Gregson," said Sherlock Holmes. "All you desire is a plain statement, is it not?" "And it is my duty to warn Mr. Scott Eccles that it may be used against him." "Mr. Eccles was going to tell us about it when you entered the room. I think, Watson, a brandy and soda would do him no harm. Now, sir, I suggest that you take no notice of this addition to your audience, and that you proceed with your narrative exactly as you would have done had you never been interrupted."

A lot of people want to argue that Holmes has a legal degree, or at least extensive training. However, these instances would certainly argue against Holmes ever having been a lawyer. He's more interested in hearing the story, no matter who it's in front of, than in protecting his client from the possible legal repercussions of making a statement in front of the police--in both cases, a statement that Holmes has no idea of what the content of the statement will be!

**Scott Eccles: "I am a bachelor," said he, "and being of a sociable turn...[Garcia] spoke perfect English, was pleasing in his manners, and as good-looking a man as ever I saw in my life...In some way we struck up quite a friendship, this young fellow and I. He seemed to take a fancy to me from the first, and within two days of our meeting he came to see me at Lee. One thing led to another, and it ended in his inviting me out to spend a few days at his house...

Some have suggested that this language hints that Scott Eccles was gay, and his stay at Wisteria Lodge was intended to be of a romantic nature.

I'm not saying that's not possible (nor do I have any problem with that). But we later learn that Garcia was attempting to establish an alibi by providing a witness of impeccable character:

He is the very type of conventional British respectability, and the very man as a witness to impress another Briton. You saw yourself how neither of the inspectors dreamed of questioning his statement, extraordinary as it was.

Given the prevailing attitude of authorities at the time, choosing a homosexual lover for that role would likely prove counter-productive. Nothing would shatter the police's trust in Scott Eccles' statement quite like "oh, you're one of them! How do we know you're not covering for your lover? Etc."

The Granada adaptation gives the men a clearer reason to get together--they're cartography buffs. At least Scott Eccles is...Garcia is probably just pretending as a pretext to build their friendship...

**Another graphic death:

"His head had been smashed to pulp by heavy blows of a sandbag or some such instrument, which had crushed rather than wounded...He had apparently been struck down first from behind, but his assailant had gone on beating him long after he was dead. It was a most furious assault."

Is it me, or has the Canon been getting bloodier and more graphic? Keeping up with post-Victorian styles and morals? Presaging the pulps? Or just Sir Arthur feeling his oats?

**The voodoo stuff is pretty much pointless. It has, ultimately, absolutely nothing to do with the mystery. Any number of excuses could have been made for the cook to want to come back. With the blood and the animal sacrifice and the fetish, it all seems to be sensationalism, not to mention probably a tiny bit racist--"ignorant savages can't leave their voodoo charms behind!'"

Granada wisely ignored the voodoo angle all together in their adaptation.

**Speaking of a Columbo-like mystery:

The attempt, whatever it may be, is to come off, we will say, before one o'clock. By some juggling of the clocks it is quite possible that they may have got Scott Eccles to bed earlier than he thought, but in any case it is likely that when Garcia went out of his way to tell him that it was one it was really not more than twelve. If Garcia could do whatever he had to do and be back by the hour mentioned he had evidently a powerful reply to any accusation. Here was this irreproachable Englishman ready to swear in any court of law that the accused was in the house all the time. It was an insurance against the worst.

The TV series Columbo used a similar gimmick--a villainous actor (played by William Shatner!) slipped his friend a mickey while they were watching a baseball game on TV. Then he taped the game with his VCR--incredibly new and expensive and rare technology at the time--while he ran out to commit the murder. When he got back, he rewound the tape, woke his buddy up, and said "You fell asleep for a minute there--but it's still only the third inning!"

**Poor Watson tries to make a deduction:

"The man was a Spaniard. I suggest that 'D' stands for Dolores, a common female name in Spain."

"Good, Watson, very good--but quite inadmissable. A Spaniard would write to a Spaniard in Spanish. The writer of this note is certainly English."

D'oh!! Poor Watson...

**One of the more uncomfortable bits of the story is the vile racism against "half-breeds" and "mulattos."

Look, I understand that black people probably weren't the most common sight in rural Victorian England, and persons of mixed race probably even less so.

But it is simply inconceivable how someone of mixed race could appear terrifying or frightening to grown men. We're talking different skin tones, not the Frankenstein Monster. Yet Constable Walters acts like he's seen a creature from Hell:

The devil, sir, for all I know. It was at the window...Lord, sir, what a face it was! I'll see it in my dreams..but it shook me, sir, and there's no use to deny it. It wasn't black, sir, nor was it white, nor any colour that I know but a kind of queer shade like clay with a splash of milk in it. Then there was the size of it--it was twice yours, sir. And the look of it--the great staring goggle eyes, and the line of white teeth like a hungry beast.

But we can't write it off as just the ignorance of a country bumpkin policeman--Watson himself describes the cook as a "man of most remarkable appearance--being a huge and hideous mulatto, with yellowish features of a pronounced negroid type."

Sweet Jesus, what a pile of racist nonsense. For shame, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle--for shame.

**Inspectors have very high standards for constables--no metaphors allowed!

"Out I ran and through the shrubbery, but thank God there was no one there."

"If I didn't know you were a good man, Walters, I should put a black mark against you for this. If it were the devil himself a constable on duty should never thank God that he could not lay his hands upon him."

**John Watson clearly hasn't kept up with his medical training: "At first, as I examined (the fetish), I thought that it was a mummified negro baby, and then it seemed a very twisted and ancient monkey. Finally I was left in doubt as to whether it was animal or human."

Sheesh...it's a good thing all the voodoo stuff was completely irrelevant. No CSI: Baker Street from Watson!

**Watson making good observations again:

I could tell by numerous subtle signs, which might have been lost upon anyone but myself, that Holmes was on a hot scent. As impassive as ever to the casual observer, there were none the less a subdued eagerness and suggestion of tension in his brightened eyes and brisker manner which assured me that the game was afoot.

**Holmes: "I say 'criminal' because only a man with a criminal enterprise desires to establish an alibi."

Really? That's hardly true, is it? I can come up with many reasons a man might want an alibi without the involvement of a "criminal enterprise." Wanting to hide an affair, wanting to hide one's involvement in a legitimate business dealing (to keep competitors from knowing you're involved, e.g.,), etc.

**Holmes describing "Henderson" a.k.a. Don Murillo:

I managed to see him on a plausible pretext, but I seemed to read in his dark, deepset, brooding eyes that he was perfectly aware of my true business. He is a man of fifty, strong, active, with iron-gray hair, great bunched black eyebrows, the step of a deer and the air of an emperor--a fierce, masterful man, with a red-hot spirit behind his parchment face. He is either a foreigner or has lived long in the tropics, for he is yellow and sapless, but tough as whipcord.

Sapless?

**So, why didn't "Miss Burnett" kill Don Pedro herself?

She's been with the household for quite awhile; she knows which room he sleeps in each night. Heaven knows there may have been ample opportunity to poison him, or kill him in his sleep.

Instead, despite having as strong a motive as everyone, she has to wait for a man to sneak into the house in a complicated plan and kill him for her.

If she was a fervently set on revenge as her speeches would have us think, she should have cut out the middle man and done the job herself.

It's more Victorian sexism, it would seem...

**Sherlock describes the time limit on the female libido: "Miss Burnet, an Englishwoman of forty or thereabouts...I may add that Miss Burnet's age and character make it certain that my first idea that there might be a love interest in our story is out of the question."

So, forty year old women can't take on lovers, or have secret rendezvous for making love. Good to know.

**Holmes and labor relations: "For the rest, his house is full of butlers, footmen, maidservants, and the usual overfed, underworked staff of a large English country house."

I suggest Holmes take a job serving the gentry, on call 24/7 and subject to the whims of the master, and see how long he feels underworked and overfed...

**John is less than eager for a bit of burglary, even though a woman's life might be jeopardy:

It was not, I must confess, a very alluring prospect. The old house with its atmosphere of murder, the singular and formidable inhabitants, the unknown dangers of the approach, and the fact that we were putting ourselves legally in a false position all combined to damp my ardour.

**Wait--how exactly did Baynes find out Henderson's true identity? Did he recognize the deposed dictator from old newspaper photographs or drawings?

We have to give Baynes full credit for actually solving the mystery while Holmes is off checking out books on voodoo from the library. But the story doesn't give us one lick of information as to how Baynes pierced Murillo's disguise, or how he tracked his previous movements through Europe.

**Sadly, this is still a thing 100 years later:

He had made his name as the most lewd and bloodthirsty tyrant that had ever governed any country with a pretence to civilization. Strong, fearless, and energetic, he had sufficient virtue to enable him to impose his odious vices upon a cowering people for ten or twelve years.

**A fierce condemnation of first world complacency from Burnet:

What does the law of England care for the rivers of blood shed years ago in San Pedro, or for the shipload of treasure which this man has stolen? To you they are like crimes committed in some other planet.

Again, all too true today...

**Ah, once again England is the battleground for the settling of foreign grievances. Seriously, the government should consider setting aside some sparsely populated area and establishing a Murderworld or Thunderdome or whatever--if all of these foreigners insist on using your country to get their revenge, at the very least you can charge them admission and participation fees...

**The villains get away? Shades of The Greek Interpreter, or The Five Orange Pips or The Resident Patient or...

**Baynes claims to be certain that the murdered Marquess of Montalva was really Don Murillo from a printed description? "A printed description of the dark face of the secretary, and of the masterful features, the magnetic black eyes, and the tufted brows of his master."

Really? We will learn in The Valley Of Fear the danger of taking identifications from vague physical descriptions...

**A final Columbo-like note: "Our difficulties are not over," he remarked, shaking his head. "Our police work ends, but our legal work begins."

I always wondered easy it was to convict those murderers Columbo caught once they lawyered up and recanted their confessions. The chain of reasoning the rumpled detective put together was frequently pretty damn far from actual evidence, and unlikely to convince a jury beyond a reasonable doubt.

The same, of course, can be said for many Holmes mysteries. There's a huge leap between solving a crime and convicting someone of it. We can imagine that a Law & Order: Baker Street would be filled with motions to suppress and other legal complications...

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE RED CIRCLE!!

The Valley Of Fear--Why A Novel?

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 07 Jun 2015 12:00:00 +0000

As I've discussed here, the first Sherlock Holmes novel, A Study In Scarlet, had some serious structural problems, breaking off after the "out of nowhere" capture of the killer for a 6-chapter digression/flashback.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's second attempt, The Sigh Of (The) Four, proved much more adept at giving us our back story, weaving in bits and pieces of exposition throughout the story. That way, the final info dump was much shorter, and much less jarring.

And in the Hound Of The Baskervilles, Doyle has pretty much mastered the form.

Which brings us to The Valley Of Fear, and what seems to be a huge step backwards.

I suppose the first question is, why is Valley a novel?

The tale was serialized in The Strand, after all of the stories eventually collected in His Last Bow, but before the story His Last Bow had been published.

Last Bow was the shortest of all the Holmes collections, with the fewest stories. Why not write the tale of Valley Of Fear as a short story, and include it in the collection? Valley could work as a short story--remove the second half, incorporate all of that exposition as a confession of Douglas, get rid of the pointless Moriarty noodling, and the story really isn't any longer than The Naval Treaty or Wisteria Lodge.

Yet Doyle chose to write it as a novel, publish it separately, and then wait two years to write the next short story and collect the most recent ones. Why? Perhaps he had a contract that called for a novel. Perhaps he was paid more for a novel, and he was in need of money at the time. Perhaps he was tiring of Holmes again, and wished to "stretch his legs" literarily. maybe he found the whole Molly Maguires case, upon which the "Scowrers" is based, fascinating, and felt the need to incorporate it into a Holmes story. Who can say?

The second, and more prominent problem, is why make it a novel in the style of A Study In Scarlet? Why do the same thing you had done with your first, unsuccessful novel--halt the story after the killer is caught, and immediately launch into a 7-chapter heap of exposition? Did Doyle unlearn the lessons he had seemingly taken to heart in Sign Of Four and Hounds?

In one way, Valley's digression is less annoying than Study In Scarlet. In the latter, we leapt away from "present day" immediately after the killer had been revealed; no time was taken to explain who the murderer was, or what his motives were, or even how Holmes had caught him. So the reader had to sit through 70-80 pages of, while not necessarily tedium, digression and distraction from what they wanted to read.

Valley, on the other hand, has the good graces to allow all of our explanations of whom killed whom, and how they killed him, and how Holmes arrived at the truth, before jumping away to the world's longest flashback. In this case, Doyle had the kindness not to leave the readers in suspense whilst they waded through 7 chapters of historical prose.

Yet, in some ways that makes this case worse than Study In Scarlet. We already know the whodunnit and howdunnit--do we really need 50-plus pages on the whydunnit? In The Dancing Men, a not dissimilar story, Doyle managed to tell us in just a few paragraphs how an American gangster had come to track down his former fiancee. Couldn't the same have been done here? Did the story really require 7 chapters of exposition to make us understand?

As with The Country Of Saints in Study In Scarlet, The Scowrers was not a bad tale. But is it ever wise to have both Holmes and Watson off stage for half of your novel?

Also, the device Doyle uses here is pretty ineffective. It's fairly obvious that John McMurdo, the point of view character for The Scowrers, is actually John Douglas. After all, Douglas gave Watson the papers that this tale was based upon, so either it's a total fiction, or it's presenting Douglas' story. Yet, The Scowrers tries very hard to convince the reader that McMurdo is a bad guy, a thug not much better than the rest of the "Eminent Order of Freeman." That seems pretty inconsistent with Douglas' story--that he's being hunted by bad men--so there is really no surprise whatsoever when it's revealed that McMurdo is really Pinkerton man Birdy Edwards, working undercover to bring down the evil Lodge from within. Seriously, was there any reader who was startled by the revelation?

The core mystery of The Valley Of Fear is very good--"This case is a snorter," as Detective White Mason said. It's essentially a locked room mystery, a corpse that proves not to be who we thought it was, with plenty of clues and interesting , well-developed characters. It's written crisply, with some wit and charm. But that basic story is not as esteemed as it should be, I think, because Doyle pads it out to a novel, and reverts to his early days of trying to stick another novella inside the tale. There's a reason that Valley has almost never been adapted to the screen, unlike the prior two novels, which TV and film can't seem to get enough of.

Which is a shame, because it is a corkin' good mystery. We just didn't need the extraneous history lesson.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**The other big "problem" with Valley Of Fear is Moriarty.

I complained a while back about Grenada series trying to make Moriarty the secret actor actually behind a lot of the crimes that Sherlock was solving. It was "big bad" syndrome, trying to use a behind-the-scenes master villain to enforce a narrative on stories that didn't really need one.

Well, Valley suffers from that big time.

It is important to note that this story would be exactly the same if Moriarty is never mentioned. Yes, the mysterious "Porlock" warns Holmes of an impending crime. Holmes and Watson spend the entire first chapter trying to decode his warning. Yet that warning was both late, and completely unnecessary, as Inspector MacDonald came to Holmes with the exact same case literally seconds later. The whole chapter spent decoding the cipher was pointless!

And even though, as far as we're told, Moriarty has no direct role in the crime--except perhaps as the man who located Douglas for the criminals--we spend the entirety of Chapter 2 listening to Holmes lecture MacDonald on the hows and whys and wherefores of the Napoleon Of Crime. Naming the chapter "Sherlock Holmes Discourses" was literally true--98% of the chapter is just Holmes on and on about his enemy--and virtually not a single word is given to the actual case at hand!!

And in the epilogue, we come back to Moriarty. Edwards had died on a sea voyage--lost overboard in a gale--and Holmes leaps to the conclusion that of course the professor must be behind it, despite there not being a scrap of evidence! (Holmes' admonition in this very story--"The temptation to form premature theories upon insufficient data is the bane of our profession"--obviously doesn't apply when Moriarty is involved!)

So we're left with 2 entire chapters and the epilogue focused on Moriarty, who has nothing to do with the mystery at hand--at least, one hopes such a crime genius would have come up with a better plan than "get an American sawed-off shot gun and hide behind a curtain!" All of this could be excised without any harm to the actual story. Eliminate that, and the extraneous 60-page history lesson, and you have a great length for a mystery short story...and then Valley Of Fear would be much better remembered than it is today.

**Of course, bootstrapping Moriarty into this case creates all sorts of continuity problems that drive people nuts. In The Final Problem, where we meet Moriarty for the first time, Watson has never heard of him. And since Moriarty dies and his organization is smashed at the end of the tale, Valley Of Fear must be set before Final Problem. Yet in this story, Watson already knows of the professor, and listens to Sherlock's lengthy disquisition about him.

That can be elided over easily enough--Watson wrote up Final Problem first, and as that's the tale that introduced Moriarty to the public, in the story he pretended not to know who he was in order to justify Holmes'unneccesary exposition to educate the reader.

As to why Watson wrote Final Problem first? Well, while Moriarty was alive, the accusations made in Valley were libelous, so Watson had to wait until the professor was convicted--or dead--to print them. And if Moriarty and Holmes were dead, well, the story in Valley Of Fear would sort of be burying the lede...

**Yet another foreign-born feud comes to England so the participants can Thunderdome it out and hope that the tender mercies of British law won't be too harsh on them.

Seriously, was this a common thing back in the day? I know London was the cosmopolitan metropolis...but was it really the crossroads for everyone seeking vengeance/lost lovers/stolen property?

Sir Arthur was also fascinated with foreign secret organizations/cults coming to Great Britain to do their business. Mormons, the Ku Klux Klan, Scowrers, Mafia...I think Doyle would have had a real good time with S.P.E.C.T.R.E., SMERSH, THRUSH...

**So who was Holmes' mysterious informant, Fred Porlock? The fact that he's not mentioned at all in The Final Problem makes us suspect that Moriarty was suspicious, and probably had him eliminated.

We do have to wonder how trustworthy Mr. Porlock was (if indeed he existed, and wasn't just a ruse of Moriarty's!). After all, his warning to Holmes about trouble coming to Birlstone wasn't sent until after Ted Baldwin had shown his face there, which means that Moriarty had already aided the Scowrers. Hardly the most timely or useful tip, then.

Holmes' description of Porlock doesn't inspire all that confidence, either: "Led on by some rudimentary aspirations towards right, and encouraged by the judicious stimulation of an occasional ten-pound note sent to him by devious methods..."

**Isn't sending the second message, that "I don't dare send you the key to the cipher," just as dangerous as sending the key itself would have been? Watson nails it: "Why did he write at all? Why did he not simply drop it?"

Holmes reply, "Because he feared I would make some inquiry after him in that case, and possibly bring trouble on him," is hardly convincing. Sherlock insisted quite loudly that Porlock knew that the detective would keep his word and not try to locate him!

And taking an envelope addressed to Holmes to the mailbox when Moriarty is already giving you the stink-eye is borderline suicidal...

**This cover, attempting to sell The Valley Of Fear as a hard-boiled crime novel, just may be my favorite thing ever:

**Holmes is very, very snarky to Watson in this tale, uncharacteristically so, I think. Early on, the detective takes a lot of sarcastic potshots at Watson's intelligence, and they don't seem like the usual good-natured ribbing:
"I am inclined to think--" said I. "I should do so," Sherlock Holmes remarked impatiently.

"Your native shrewdness, my dear Watson, that innate cunning which is the delight of your friends..."

"Perhaps there are points which have escaped your Machiavellian intellect."

Especially given the context of each occasion, it seems Sherlock is being needlessly mean.

Holmes does mellow later, especially after he learns that his theory of the case was completely wrong...

**Of course, Watson gives some of his own, famously:

"The famous scientific criminal, as famous among crooks as--"

"My blushes, Watson!" Holmes murmured in a deprecating voice.

"I was about to say, as he is unknown to the public."

"A touch! A distinct touch!" cried Holmes. "You are developing a certain unexpected vein of pawky humour, Watson, against which I must learn to guard myself.

**This story is our first--and only--meeting with Inspector Alec MacDonald, although Watson does refer to an unknown number of apocryphal adventures with the inspector.

Holmes keeps affectionately referring to him as "Mr. Mac," which is highly unusual. A sign of familiarity and respect?

Watson says that eventually, MacDonald will achieve "national fame," although he doesn't tell us what was responsible for such fame.

Important MacDonald note: "his accent became more Aberdonian as he lost himself in his argument."

**This story is full of competent and respected policeman, a far cry from what Holmes feels that he usually has to deal with.

Aside from Inspector MacDonald, there is also detective White Mason, who both Watson and Holmes had respect for: "He impressed me, this country specialist. He had a solid grip of fact and a cool, clear, common-sense brain, which should take him some way in his profession...Holmes listened to him intently, with no sign of that impatience which the official exponent too often produced."

Sergeant Wilson was also portrayed as smart and capable. This is by far the best array of officers in the Canon. And you can see it through the lengthy and intricate discussions of facts and theories that Holmes conducts with them throughout.

**Then again, they were slow to twig to the threat of Moriarty: "I won't conceal from you, Mr. Holmes, that we think in the C.I.D. that you have a wee bit of a bee in your bonnet over this professor."

**Wise words: "Mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself; but talent instantly recognizes genius..."

**"I may remind you," Holmes continued, "that the professor's salary can be ascertained in several trustworthy books of reference. It is seven hundred a year."

Really? There is not just one book, but several, that list the salaries of university professors?

**Holmes: "That's paying for brains, you see--the American business principle."

I suppose at the time of writing, American capitalism must have been viewed as swift and agile next to hidebound, nepotism-riddled, class-restricted British businesses. Not so much anymore...

**Holmes again serves as an early version of the NSA: "I made it my business to hunt down some of Moriarty's checks lately--just common innocent checks that he pays his household bills with. They were drawn on six different banks."

Viewing peoples checks, obtaining their telegrams--Sherlock Holmes had little sense of a person's right to privacy, when he was on a scent...

**Moats!! The house had not one, but TWO moats!!! Yes, one was filled in...but come on, a freakin' moat!!! You're not going to see that in any mystery set in America!! Moats!!

And a drawbridge!! A. Draw. Bridge. Heavens, I'm experience some nerd nirvana here!!

**For a Sherlock Holmes story, this was fairly graphic: "It was clear that this had been fired at close range and that he had received the whole charge in the face, blowing his head almost to pieces."

Eww.

**"But surely I have heard that the drawbridge is kept up all night."
"Yes, it was up until I lowered it."
"Then how could any murderer have got away? It is out of the question! Mr. Douglas must have shot himself."

It's a pretty big manor (the pantry is so far away your can't hear a shotgun blast). Wouldn't it have been possible for the killer to have hidden somewhere in the house until Ames lowered the drawbridge, and then escaped when he went for the police? Obviously, we know that's not what happened. But within the fiction our conspirators set up, it seems to be that the murderer certainly could have gotten away without some locked-room miracle...

**The tale is that Ted Baldwin snuck in the house before the drawbridge was closed--6 pm at the latest--and then hid behind a curtain in the study until he attacked at 10:45ish.

So the assassin hid behind the curtains for almost 5 hours?!? That's patience!

**Oh, the bucolic English life: "That, of course, proves nothing at all," remarked Inspector MacDonald. "There has been many a hammer murder and no trace on the hammer."

"Many a hammer murder."

Don't let them tell you that America is naturally more violent than England...

**"That is very helpful, Mr. Holmes. No doubt you are right. Wonderful! Wonderful! Do you carry the names of all the gun makers in the world in your memory?" Holmes dismissed the subject with a wave.

Well, duh. Of course he would...

**MacDonald has to reassure White Mason that Holmes isn't there to steal credit for solving the case:

"I have worked with Mr. Holmes before," said Inspector MacDonald. "He plays the game."

"My own idea of the game, at any rate," said Holmes, with a smile. "I go into a case to help the ends of justice and the work of the police. If I have ever separated myself from the official force, it is because they have first separated themselves from me. I have no wish ever to score at their expense."

**Inspector MacDonald makes the case for bicycle registration: "It would be a grand help to the police," said the inspector, "if these things were numbered and registered."

Apparently, there was a fair amount of bicycle-based crime in the late 1880s.

Just don't let the bicycle rights nuts hear you say something like that, Mr. Mac!

**Doyle gives an awful lot of behavioral bits to Ivy and Cecil that are pretty both good red herrings and, upon re-reading, nice tip-offs to the big revelation at the end. Well played, sir.

**Watson's conception of Holmes' independence: "Mr. Holmes is an independent investigator," I said. "He is his own master, and would act as his own judgment directed. At the same time, he would naturally feel loyalty towards the officials who were working on the same case, and he would not conceal from them anything which would help them in bringing a criminal to justice.

Well, unless he felt justice were better served by concealing the truth. Which he has done plenty of times before...

**Holmes eating like a Dalek: "My dear Watson, when I have exterminated that fourth egg I shall be ready to put you in touch with the whole situation."

**Ululation? Ululation?!? Oh. Sir Arthur...

**"And yet there should be no combination of events for which the wit of man cannot conceive an explanation."

Another clear statement over why I have little time for Holmes pastiches involving the supernatural...

**"Well, bar the expression, that might almost be a description of Douglas himself," said Holmes. "He is just over fifty, with grizzled hair and moustache, and about the same height. Did you get anything else?"

Well, if modern readers were in doubt, that sort of gives the game away, doesn't it?

It's another case of something that might seem cliche to modern readers--the defaced corpse isn't who you think it is--so we probably solved this case in our heads a lot more quickly than Edwardian fans.

**Holmes, realizing how wrong he was: "I say, Watson," he whispered, "would you be afraid to sleep in the same room with a lunatic, a man with softening of the brain, an idiot whose mind has lost its grip?"

This is probably as close as Sherlock comes to an apology.

**Holmes, claiming to be playing fair whilst being maddeningly oblique:

On the other hand, I said that I would play the game fairly by you, and I do not think it is a fair game to allow you for one unnecessary moment to waste your energies upon a profitless task. Therefore I am here to advise you this morning, and my advice to you is summed up in three words--abandon the case.

That's hardly playing fair, though...just because they're looking at the wrong victim, doesn't mean that there isn't a crime to investigate!

And more from Sherlock:

"I consider your case to be hopeless. I do not consider that it is hopeless to arrive at the truth."

"Why in the name of goodness should we abandon the case?" "For the simple reason, my dear Mr. Mac, that you have not got the first idea what it is that you are investigating."

Dude, you could just tell them. But no, that's not you at all, is it, Holmes?

"Watson insists that I am the dramatist in real life," said he. "Some touch of the artist wells up within me, and calls insistently for a well-staged performance. Surely our profession, Mr. Mac, would be a drab and sordid one if we did not sometimes set the scene so as to glorify our results. The blunt accusation, the brutal tap upon the shoulder--what can one make of such a denouement? But the quick inference, the subtle trap, the clever forecast of coming events, the triumphant vindication of bold theories--are these not the pride and the justification of our life's work?

**Holmes, on how reading up on ancient architecture helped him solve the case: "Breadth of view, my dear Mr. Mac, is one of the essentials of our profession. The interplay of ideas and the oblique uses of knowledge are often of extraordinary interest."

Please note the marked contrast to Holmes' early position, as described by Watson in Study In Scarlet: "[T]he skilful workman is very careful indeed as to what he takes into his brain-attic."

Apparently, Sherlock has mellowed on that front a bit, no longer fearing that he shall run out of brain room.

**What a great reveal: "I should strongly recommend that you ask Mr. Douglas to tell us his own story."

**Just as Study In Scarlet proved to be somewhat controversial in its portrayal of the early Mormons, some have called into question the cases against the historical "Scowrers," the Molly Maguires. Doyle seems to have based his fictionalization largely on the book by Allan Pinkerton, founder of the detective agency. But a number of historians have suggested the cases were exaggerated, or perhaps even completely made up to justify cracking down on labor movements.

At least in this case, Doyle did indeed fictionalize the groups and events, a lesson he no doubt learned from the reaction to his portrayal of Mormons earlier.

**Mr. Schafter and his daughter Ettie were German originally, and in the American edition. But WWI made sympathetic German characters unacceptable in England, so editions there changed them to Swedish extraction...

**Despite my reservations about the length and appropriateness of the Scowrers tale, it is a good story, well told--a Donnie Brasco for the Pennsylvania mining scene.

**I really don't like the epilogue. Why kill the man we just spent 60 pages getting to know? The sole reason to end the affair on such a down note, it seems, is to prove that Moriarty was a badass. Well, we already knew that! What a terrible way to end the story!

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF WISTERIA LODGE!

The Adventure Of The Second Stain--A Tale Of Two Letters!

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 24 May 2015 12:00:00 +0000

There is a letter whose exact contents remain unrevealed. But if this letter were to be made public, it would have extremely damaging consequences: relationships would be broken, and the status quo irrevocably altered, and not for the better. So terrible is this letter, that people will go to nay lengths to keep its words from being unveiled publicly.

Actually, there are two such letters!!

Which brings us to The Adventure Of The Second Stain.

There is quite a clever little double act that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle has set up, as it becomes very easy to forget that there are two scandalous missives at large in this tale. But we shouldn't forget, because they provide an intriguing mirror to each other, and display how the personal can be just as frightening, just as damaging as the political. Despite what Lord Bellinger and The Right Honourable Trewlaney Hope aver, it is incontestably untrue that "in the case of a secret of this importance it would rise superior to the most intimate domestic ties." And this refusal to admit any spillover of their public and private worlds that causes most of the problems in this story.

Most obviously, we have the letter from an unnamed "foreign potentate," apparently written in an angry moment, which threatens the peace of the entire continent. Let's let our Stuffy Government Officials describe it for us:

[T]he document in question is of such immense importance that its publication might very easily--I might almost say probably--lead to European complications of the utmost moment. It is not too much to say that peace or war may hang upon the issue...

...The letter, then, is from a certain foreign potentate who has been ruffled by some recent Colonial developments of this country. It has been written hurriedly and upon his own responsibility entirely. Inquiries have shown that his Ministers know nothing of the matter. At the same time it is couched in so unfortunate a manner, and certain phrases in it are of so provocative a character, that its publication would undoubtedly lead to a most dangerous state of feeling in this country. There would be such a ferment, sir, that I do not hesitate to say that within a week of the publication of that letter this country would be involved in a great war...this letter which may well mean the expenditure of a thousand millions and the lives of a hundred thousand men...

...But if you consider the European situation you will have no difficulty in perceiving the motive. The whole of Europe is an armed camp. There is a double league which makes a fair balance of military power. Great Britain holds the scales. If Britain were driven into war with one confederacy, it would assure the supremacy of the other confederacy, whether they joined in the war or not.

All that, from one letter? Well, we'll come back to that in a minute.

What is often overlooked, because Holmes has already solved the titular clue by the time the issue arises, is that another embarrassing letter was the instigating incident for the other piece of mail's vanishing! There wasn't just a second stain--there was a second letter!!

Lady Hilda Trelawney Hope, it turns out, had one of those indiscreet romances that we've seen before in these stories. Let her tell us the tale:

It was a letter of mine, Mr. Holmes, an indiscreet letter written before my marriage--a foolish letter, a letter of an impulsive, loving girl. I meant no harm, and yet he would have thought it criminal. Had he read that letter his confidence would have been forever destroyed. It is years since I wrote it. I had thought that the whole matter was forgotten.

...On the one side seemed certain ruin, on the other, terrible as it seemed to take my husband's paper, still in a matter of politics I could not understand the consequences, while in a matter of love and trust they were only too clear to me.

So there we have it. Two "foolish letters," "indiscreet" and "hot-headed." Each with shattering consequences if it were revealed. Each of our parties is too frozen by fear to notice what is happening to the other. Trelawney is afraid of the global implications, he can't conceive of a personal problem that could compare to it. But Hilda is equally misguided, more afraid of the consequences to her marriage than potential international political consequences. I suppose a base moral we could draw right away is that, if these two could only communicate better, this mystery wouldn't have happened.

Drawing some larger lessons, we can wonder first about the international implications of the letter from the mysterious sovereign. Who was this foreign leader? What could he possibly have said? How could a simple letter have had such frightful implications?

Many Holmes scholars have suggested that our foreign leader might be Germany's Kaiser Wilhelm II. Nothing in the story actually confirms that--Watson is, after all discreet--but it's a fair guess, given his known behaviour and the political situation of the times.

As to what the letter could have actually said? Well, that may seem something of a mystery to modern readers. It's hard to imagine a letter so inflammatory that it could drive the English public to demand war, isn't it? What could be so provocative, "couched in such an unfortunate manner," that it could cause such fury? "Dear Queen Victoria: You are ugly, and I fart in your general direction! You English are tiny-brained wipers of other people's bottoms! Your mother was a hamster, and your father smelled of elderberry! Signed, The King Of Belgium!"??

It is possible, of course, that Hope and Bellinger were gravely overestimating the impact the letter would have, clutching their pearls, as it were, and imaging that something embarrassing somehow equated to a cause for war. Or, perhaps, they were deliberately overstating the threat from the letter, to ensure that Holmes would assist them.

Of course, it's also possible that, as a political species, we've matured a little bit over the past century and a quarter. After all, it's not uncommon for, say, secret U.S. State Department documents to leak, with American officials being caught saying unflattering things about foreign leaders and nations. And it's all too frequent for leaders to make public gaffes, straying outside the official lines to say something they probably shouldn't say publicly (as Michael Kinsley says, "A gaffe is when a politician tells the truth."). Yet war doesn't seem to result from indiscreet words. Apologies are issued, feathers are ruffled, and in about three days all is forgotten and more or less back to normal. Stick and stones may start wars, but words will never hurt us.

After all, this is unlike The Naval Treaty, wherein Britain and Italy secretly agreed to certain actions, or to support each other against others, or something--it was, after all a secret treaty. But at least there were specific actions and concrete promises which might trigger foreign responses, not just indiscreet and inflammatory words. Or did the Kaiser (or whomever) actually threaten war in the letter? A promise to attack over certain British "colonial developments?"

Another thing to note is the high level of respect, if not worship for diplomats--at least from other diplomats. The potentate may be the sovereign of his nation, but we're told he shouldn't be sending letters without the approval of his ministers. Why, without government functionaries to parse every word and smooth every phrase, the consequences could be "a thousand million pounds and the lives of hundreds of thousands of men!" Leaders should sit back, and let the bureaucrats do all the actual communication (and by implication, perhaps, the actual policy-making?)! We can't trust sovereigns to rule!

Just as a simple letter can potentially cause international chaos, we're given a similar situation on a personal level. We've seen this before, especially in the case of Charles Augustus Milverton. A young woman, before her marriage, writes an indiscreet letter to a someone (Boyfriend? Lover?), that if it were revealed would cause the immediate dissolution of her current marriage.

I have already discussed, in the essay about Charles Augustus Milverton, how such blackmail schemes are, in part, a reflection of Victorian gender politics. A woman, it seems must be emotionally a virgin as well as physically, or her husband will reject her. (Then again, we saw a powerful male scared that word of a former dalliance might come to light in Scandal In Bohemia, so the phenomenon was not exclusively gender hypocrisy...)

What, pray tell, could have been in Lady Hilda's that was so damning? She says that Trelawney "would think it criminal"--is this just a metaphor? Is her shame enlarging the "crime" in her mind to epic proportions? Or do the letters indicate that she was involved in something actually forbidden by law, such as adultery, or a lesbian relationship?

Or perhaps it's fear of her priggish husband, the man who won't even discuss his job with her, and avers to Holmes that politics is more important than his wife. Hilda tells us "[H]is own honour stands so high that he could not forget or pardon a lapse in another." That's not honor--that's standing in obnoxious moral judgement of others. "I'm perfect, so if you're not, you're shit"?!? This is surely not someone I would want to married to.

Then again, that may be her fear and shame talking again. Perhaps if she were honest with him, Trelawney Hope would have easily forgiven her, as happened in The Yellow Face. And perhaps if he had been honest with her, she would never have taken the envelope if the first place, or returned it right away once she learned of its importance.

Similarly, if the English government had not been obsessed with secrecy, perhaps this wouldn't have been a crisis. Obviously, in the spin-doctor run 21st century, the Prime Minister et al would have tried to get in front of this story, to lessen the blow if the letter were revealed. The imprudent sovereign's ministers will deny the letter's veracity, as they had nothing to do with it, so you're already halfway home. Put a fake story out there, saying the Foreign Ministry had been receiving forged letters, allegedly from heads of state, seeking to foment war. Release the less inflammatory parts of the letter (if there were any!) to the press, so the full letter's release would not be thought "news." Arrange a quick summit or treaty with the foreign potentate, so everyone sees you're all good friends. Have Victoria "backdate" a letter from herself to the leader, making it look as this had all been part of a quasi-joking exchange. Instead of simply sitting around and hoping that the letter is never revealed, get active, and find a way to minimize the damage.

Two letters, written imprudently. If revealed, the consequences will be disastrous, either to the continent or personally. Yet people are so frightened at the possibility of the missives becoming public, they act foolishly, and let secrecy nearly destroy everything.

The Second Stain is really a story about communication, and secrets. It's about how there really is no difference between the personal and political--rulers and lovers will say stupid things, and everyone else has to learn how to handle the fallout.

Honestly, given the dangerous outcomes, it's a wonder people ever put pen to paper for a letter in those days...

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**As we've previously mentioned, there have been two prior mentions of this case...of have there?

In The Yellow Face (the British edition, at least), Watson listed "the affair of the second stain" (no capitals) as one of Holmes' few failures. Well, that doesn't seem to match this case at all.

In The Naval Treaty, Watson goes on at length about "The Adventure Of The Second Stain" which

deals with interest of such importance and implicates so many of the first families in the kingdom that for many years it will be impossible to make it public. No case, however, in which Holmes was engaged has ever illustrated the value of his analytical methods so clearly or has impressed those who were associated with him so deeply. I still retain an almost verbatim report of the interview in which he demonstrated the true facts of the case to Monsieur Dubugue of the Paris police, and Fritz von Waldbaum, the well-known specialist of Dantzig, both of whom had wasted their energies upon what proved to be side-issues.

Well, again, that doesn't seem terribly apt to this case, especially the "demonstration" to French and German detectives.

I guess Sir Arthur just had a real liking for the title, and unlike most of the "apocryphal" cases mentioned in the Canon, he came up with an actual case to portray. Even if he had forgotten what he had hinted about the case earlier...

**Speaking of which..."I have notes of many hundreds of cases to which I have never alluded..."

Watson!! Get writing!!

**Once again, this is the "final" Holmes story. He's retired, you see, and he doesn't want the "notoriety" any longer.

At least Doyle had learned his lesson this time, and didn't kill him off only to have to resurrect him again.

The gap between published stories would be much shorter, this time.

**Perhaps the biggest unanswered question about Second Stain is, why keep the letter? Why doesn't the government destroy it?!?

This is a letter whose revelation will surely lead to war and great loss of life. And England does not want it revealed.

Yet, for the past 6 days, Trelawney Hope has carried the letter back and forth between work and home each day!! Good heavens, that's a terrible risk to take, isn't it? If the letter is so dangerous, why keep it around? Why risk any possibility of it getting out?

The only thing I can think of is that the government wanted to keep it around, so they could blackmail the imprudent potentate at some later point. or perhaps to use the letter when Britain was more ready to go to war--then they would release the letter to foment war-fever amongst the populace.

Otherwise, why not burn the deuced thing immediately upon recovering it?!?

Not a particularly flattering portrayal of Her Majesty's ministers...

**As has been noted, Second Stain comes across as a amalgam of other stories. Most obviously, it strongly resembles The Naval Treaty--a vital government document is stolen, which could lead to war and the end of a client's career, but it's found hidden in the client's own house. It's also clearly an echo of Charles Augustus Milverton, with a cad blackmailing women over their previous dalliances (the Granada adaptation goes so far as to use some actual dialogue from CAM when they show Eduardo Lucas putting the screws to lady Hilda!). The Yellow Face had a wife with a secret so dark that she was certain that it would destroy her marriage. The emergency causing the villain to reveal the hiding place reminds of of Scandal in Bohemia. And most recently, Abbey Grange had Holmes begging people to "be frank" with him, so he could properly cover up matters.

**Watson on Trelawney: "dark, clear-cut, and elegant, hardly yet of middle age, and endowed with every beauty of body and of mind..."

Some might suspect that "beauty of the mind" shouldn't locking your wife out of the most important aspect of your life. Or being willing to dump her if you found out that she had had an earlier relationship (although perhaps that was just lady Hilda's paranoia speaking...).

**"They sat side by side upon our paper-littered settee..."

Dudes--these are high government officials!! You're making the Secretary For European Affairs and the former Prime Minister sit on your messy clippings collection? Stop hoarding, and clean your place up!!!

**What the hell is wrong with security at the Foreign Office? "[The letter] was of such importance that I have never left it in my safe, but have taken it across each evening to my house in Whitehall Terrace..."

Sir, if you think that your safe at work is not secure, than you need to have some immediate work done in that building!! And it's hard to imagine that your locked despatch-box at home is seriously more secure than a government safe, no matter how arrogant you are about how wonderful your servants are.

Then again, this was the same building (presumably) as in The Naval Treaty, wherein a civilian can just walk in through an unguarded door after hours and make his way to offices without ever once encountering any security whatsoever. I guess home doesn't look like such a bad option. But that's not excuse for not upgrading security at the Foreign office!!

**Trelawney Hope insisted that "besides the members of the Cabinet there are two, or possibly three, departmental officials who know of the letter. No one else in England, Mr. Holmes, I assure you."

Well, somehow Eduardo Lucas found out. "He had some spy in the office who had told him of its existence," Lady Hilda tells us. And Lucas had good enough information that he was able to give an accurate physical description of the envelope.

So either a) A cabinet minister is a traitor, b) one of the two or possibly three officials are a traitor, or c) somehow someone else who was close enough to describe the letter was a traitor.

But there is absolutely no follow-up to this. This person is never mentioned to Hope and Bellinger, and Holmes does his best to make people think the letter was never taken. Yet this person still knows of the letter's existence!!

So this person is still employed, and still able to betray England's secrets to the highest bidder. Another reason why Holmes may have been wrong to take justice into his own hands. In order to protect a lady's honor and marriage, he has allowed a snake to continue to nest in the highest levels of government...

**Trelawney Hope's absolute faith in his servants really is silly. Not that we have any reason to suspect them. But we've seen in other stories, such as Charles August Milverton, that many a serving class person is willing to betray their 1% masters for a sufficient price. To swear that his employees are perfectly happy and thus immune is arrogance talking, especially when he keeps insisting that no one could have gotten into the house from outside.

**Holmes on some international men of mystery: "There are three who may be said to be the heads of their profession. I will begin my research by going round and finding if each of them is at his post."

How can they be great spies if they're so well known? I mean, he is Holmes, after all, so of course he knows them. But still, when a daring theft occurs and the immediate response is "it can only have been one of these 3 people," that means that their cover is well known, and that has to counter their effectiveness, right? Couldn't the government just deport them? Wouldn't the government have them under fairly constant surveillance? Or does only Holmes know this information?

**Holmes getting practical: "all, it is a question of money with these fellows, and I have the British treasury behind me. If it's on the market I'll buy it--if it means another penny on the income-tax."

Sherlock is being fairly cavalier with other people's tax money, but as a matter of efficiency, he's certainly correct. If you can just buy the letter back, and avoid cloak-and-dagger shenanigans, that's by far the best policy.

Still it's probably a good thing that he didn't have the British treasury behind him on most cases...it would make for some fairly dull mysteries if Holmes just showed up flashing huge wads of cash, yelling "Money for whomever gives me answers!!'

**One of the better comedy moments in the Canon:

There are only those three capable of playing so bold a game--there are Oberstein, La Rothiere, and Eduardo Lucas. I will see each of them."

I glanced at my morning paper.

"Is that Eduardo Lucas of Godolphin Street?"

"Yes."

"You will not see him."

"Why not?"

"He was murdered in his house last night."

My friend has so often astonished me in the course of our adventures that it was with a sense of exultation that I realized how completely I had astonished him.

Well played, John Watson!

**Just how good a spy was Lucas?

All of this information is from newspaper accounts:

Mr. Eduardo Lucas, well known in society circles both on account of his charming personality and because he has the well-deserved reputation of being one of the best amateur tenors in the country...

A comparison of photographs has proved conclusively that M. Henri Fournaye and Eduardo Lucas were really one and the same person, and that the deceased had for some reason lived a double life in London and Paris

We need more playboy tenors who lead double lives and have crazy wives following them about serving as spies. Seriously, getting yourself famous is not a good way to lead a "secret double life," right? And jealous women stalking you, as we saw, cannot be good for a spy career...

**Holmes, on Lucas being murdered just as Holmes decides that he's one of the top suspects:

A coincidence! Here is one of the three men whom we had named as possible actors in this drama, and he meets a violent death during the very hours when we know that that drama was being enacted. The odds are enormous against its being coincidence. No figures could express them. No, my dear Watson, the two events are connected--MUST be connected. It is for us to find the connection.

Of course, it was a complete coincidence, although we can hardly blame Sherlock for making the same leap we all no doubt did when reading the story.

Then again, he never apologized to Watson, or admitted his error.

**Oh, John, the fair sex really is your department! His description of Lady Hilda: "the most lovely woman in London...the subtle, delicate charm and the beautiful colouring of that exquisite head...It was a queenly presence--tall, graceful, and intensely womanly."

Now, I don't want to suggest that Watson is easily smitten with female clients, or that he exaggerates at all.

Yet Constable MacPherson was not nearly so impressed: " respectable," "very pleasant, "genteel." When pressed, he admitted "I suppose you might say she was handsome."

That hardly seems like someone describing "the most lovely woman in London." Yes, Hilda was trying to be incognito, so she might have trying to be a bit dowdy. But MacPherson still recognized her instantly from her picture.

Let that be a lesson: one man's "most lovely woman" is another's "well, I suppose you might say she was handsome."

And, perhaps, Watson is a little too easily charmed by a pretty woman...

**Lady Hilda: "There is complete confidence between my husband and me on all matters save one. That one is politics."

Well, obviously not, as you so desperately wish to make sure that not even a hint of your youthful letter exists.

So you've lied to Holmes, and no doubt yourself...

**I don't want to pick on Lady Hilda too much. The shame spiral/panic is a tough beast to be under the control of.

But on the day the letter is discovered missing:

"Is my husband's political career likely to suffer through this incident?"

"Well, madam, unless it is set right it may certainly have a very unfortunate effect."

"Ah!" She drew in her breath sharply as one whose doubts are resolved.

"One more question, Mr. Holmes. From an expression which my husband dropped in the first shock of this disaster I understood that terrible public consequences might arise from the loss of this document."

"If he said so, I certainly cannot deny it."

And yet she still won't turn over the letter!! Perhaps she could be forgiven about initially taking the letter. She had no idea what is was, thank to her husband's policy of keeping "politics" completely secret from him.

But now, thanks to Holmes, she knows that it's going to ruin his career, and perhaps cause terrible public consequences.

Yet even when she gets the letter back, she still won't return it!! Why?

"I could hardly prevent myself from there and then kneeling down at his feet and telling him what I had done. But that again would mean a confession of the past."

So covering up her past is more important that her family's welfare, and that of the nation? She'd rather let her husband suffer disgrace? Good heavens, what self-importance she attributes to her "past."

Especially when she could have found other ways to return the letter without confessing: put it back in the despatch-box herself; stash it under the bed or against the wainscoting and dramatically declare "look what I found!"; drop it in the post anonymously to her husband's office; give it to Holmes and have him make up a story about finding it (perhaps at Lucas' scene!).

But keeping it hidden, for 4 days after she knew the potential consequences? Staggeringly selfish.

**Apocryphal case: "You remember the woman at Margate whom I suspected for the same reason. No powder on her nose--that proved to be the correct solution."

**"Only one important thing has happened in the last three days, and that is that nothing has happened."

As with the dog who did nothing in the night-time, a wonderful example of negative evidence.

**Wait...Lestrade called in Holmes because the stains didn't match? He couldn't have figured out for himself that meant that someone had moved the carpet, and it had to have been either the constable or someone he had allowed into the room?

Maybe there is no hope for him.

** **Lady Hilda's was quite busy. She went to Lucas' to be confronted about her letter; she made an impression of her husband's key, and took that to Lucas; she went to Lucas to get the new key; after she had taken the letter, she brought it to Lucas. And after Lucas' murder, she came back to steal it from his hiding place.

That's a lot of visits to his dwelling, even if he lived only a "short walk" from the Hope home. One can only wonder that her husband never got suspicious.

**So, where did Lucas get the Hilda's letter from? From her former love interest? From a servant?

**Why the hell did Holmes carry a picture of Hilda with him?

I suppose that, as Holmes initially knew that someone inside the household must be involved, she was considered a suspect. That only increased with her visit to Baker Street. So it made sense to carry a picture to help identify any female suspect.

But where did he get a photo portrait to cut her face from?!?

**Victory?

You will be relieved to hear that there will be no war, that the Right Honourable Trelawney Hope will suffer no setback in his brilliant career, that the indiscreet Sovereign will receive no punishment for his indiscretion, that the Prime Minister will have no Europe an complication to deal with, and that with a little tact and management upon our part nobody will be a penny the worse for what might have been a very ugly incident.

Well, Trelawney Hope must appear as an idiot to his peers, which can't help his "brilliant career." The indiscreet sovereign's suffering no punishment may only encourage him to be indiscreet in the future. The man in the Foreign office who passed the information on to Lucas is still there.

And most importantly, Hope and his wife still have secrets from each other, and would willingly risk ruin and war rather than be honest with each other. I can't say that a expect a happy future for them as a couple.

**Great closing line: "We also have our diplomatic secrets."

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE VALLEY OF FEAR!!

The Adventure of The Abbey Grange--Judge, Jury and Executioner?!?

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 17 May 2015 12:00:00 +0000

The Adventure Of The Abbey Grange, of course, is the source of one of the more famous Sherlock Holmes quotes: "The game is afoot!"

As it turns out, Abbey Grange is also the story that makes us ask whether or not Sherlock Holmes is treating justice too much like a game.

We have seen thus far many stories where Holmes does not turn in the perpetrator. In A Case of Identity, there was no crime committed, and Holmes also decided that it would be far too icky to tell his client that she was wooed by her own stepfather. In The Boscombe Valley Mystery, the murderer was dying, and Holmes made sure that he left a signed confession so no innocent party would be convicted. In The Blue Carbuncle, Holmes hadn't been hired by the police, and chose to show holiday-inspired mercy to an inept thief who seemed unlikely to break the law again. In Beryl Coronet, Holmes allowed a blackguard to flee in order to protect his client--as well as one of England's "highest, noblest, most exalted names"--from scandal. In Copper Beeches, Holmes did not turn in Rucastle for kidnapping--perhaps because his victim had escaped and eloped, perhaps because the detective thought getting mauled by a dog was punishment enough.

In The Naval Treaty, Holmes allowed Joseph to flee, in order to get the papers back, although he did wire Scotland Yard about him--but not until the next morning. In The Priory School, Sherlock was persuaded by a very wealthy man to allow the villain to get away ("no, really, he's leaving the country and will reform!!"). He lied to the police about his knowledge of the murder of Charles Augustus Milverton, because the blackmailer had it coming (and to turn in the mysterious lady would have incriminated he and Watson for burglary!).

So, there have been plenty of times when Holmes has substituted his own judgement for that of the official legal system. It's hardly a rare occurrence. Whether it is because he feels the criminal has been punished harshly enough, or in order to best protect his client, Holmes has shown little compunction about covering up the truth, and allowing criminals to go.

Holmes tells Watson that "Once or twice in my career I feel that I have done more real harm by my discovery of the criminal than ever he had done by his crime. I have learned caution now, and I had rather play tricks with the law of England than with my own conscience." Perhaps Sir Arthur Conan Doyle should have shown us one of those stories, where Holmes turning in the crook did "more harm than the criminal deserved." As a reader, I'd like to see something concrete to justify Holmes' decision to use his "right of private judgement" so often.

Personally, I find the "protect someone from scandal" excuse fairly flimsy. If the "highest, noblest, most exalted name" in England did something so ridiculously stupid--pawning a national treasure!!--perhaps it is in the best interest of the nation to let that news become public, especially when the stupid act results in sordid consequences. If the Duke of Holderness aids and abets murderers and kidnappers to hide the fact that he has an illegitimate son, well, maybe it is better that the truth comes out, so no one will trust him with public office again. If a government clerk (who got his post through nepotism) is careless enough to leave an important secret treaty on the desk of his unlocked office while he goes to get coffee--well, maybe he should have to resign his office in disgrace.

In Abbey Grange, the problem is perhaps a bit more tangled. In this case, Holmes is not protecting his client--he was brought in by Inspector Hopkins. So in this instance, by covering up the murders, he is actually acting against his client's wishes and interests.

And yet, if we believe the story spun by Croker--a huge if, to be sure--certainly he and Lady Brackenstall are certainly more deserving of mercy than many of the other criminals Holmes has chosen to let off the hook.

That fact, though, makes it all the more curious why Holmes might circumvent the police and courts. If their story is true, Croker certainly has a very strong case for self-defense, or even justifiable homicide, in defense of Mary. And as for Mary, if Croker is found not guilty, it would be difficult to convict her of being an accomplice. Both still might face some type of obstruction charges--lying to the police, tampering with evidence--but given that they killed man and covered it up, that's hardly too large an inconvenience to suffer, is it? And surely the woman who declared that "this English life, with its proprieties and its primness, is not congenial to me" is not afraid of some scandal, especially when the fact of Sir Eustace's behaviour was already "known to everyone." If it is so obvious that a jury would acquit, why does Holmes feel the need to "take a great responsibility" upon himself?

And when you throw in the possibility that "innocent" people--the Randall family of burglars--were being framed for murder, well, that adds to the scales on the side of telling Inspector Hopkins everything, doesn't it? Theresa, Mary and Captain Croker had no way of knowing that the "Lewisham gang" had fled to America (or did they?). By basing their false tale of murderous burglars on a real group of people, they quite deliberately put the Randalls in jeopardy of facing the gallows for a crime these criminals didn't commit. No matter how sympathetic you are to the conspirators, that kind of recklessness with the lives of others should not--cannot--be condoned. In my view, at least, the selfishness of the "Abbey Grange Gang"--the willingness to put others in jeopardy of capital punishment to cover their own, supposedly lesser, crime--suggests that they don't deserve to have the affair covered up by Holmes.

It should also be noted that perhaps we should not trust the veracity of Croker's story. When you reread the story, you realize that 100% of the evidence Holmes finds, and the 100% deductions he makes, are of events after the murder. There is not one shred of evidence to support the captain's version of events--that he came in (through the window!!) for a platonic goodbye, that Sir Eustace then came in and attacked first. There is nothing to support this tale besides the testimony of the conspirators themselves, who have already proven less than trustworthy.

Some commentators have suggested that Lady Brackenstall was really a very clever murderess. Some go so far as to suggest she made up the stories of abuse, stabbing herself with hatpins to make her husband look like a cad. With this she lured Captain Croker to keep seeing her, and to come to her "defense." Or perhaps Mary and Croker were having an affair, and this was an attempt by them to remove her husband from the picture. These strike me as too clever by half--a frame, wrapped around a carefully cultivated lie to bring forth if anyone saw through that? Still, none of these possibilities are ruled out by any of the evidence that Holmes gathers. Perhaps, then, Sherlock should not be so quick to extend his mercy and subvert the law.

Finally, Holmes himself seems less than firmly resolved to keep the police away from the truth. He tells Hopkins where the silver was, and tries to convince the inspector to accept the theory that it was a blind. This could only have led to the conclusion that Lady Brackenstall's tale was not true, had Hopkins had the sense to use it. Holmes declaration at the end of the tale--"I have given Hopkins an excellent hint and if he can't avail himself of it I can do no more"--does not sound like the attitude of a man who is convinced that he is morally right in this matter. It sounds more as if he is playing a game, rolling the 12-sided die for the fate of all involved.

Ironically, with his constant 'testing' of Croker--"and you ring true every time"--Holmes is doing exactly what he accuses Watson of doing--reacting to emotional responses, instead of real evidence and justice!

By our modern times, we're used to vigilantes in fiction, those who take the law into their own hands. Heroes who decide who should be punished, and who shouldn't. In this, as in so many other ways, Sherlock Holmes was a pioneer.

But Holmes was not omniscient. In this very case he nearly "committed the blunder of [his] lifetime." One would hope that he would be far less cavalier in letting thieves and murderers roam free, more cautious in protecting the rest of the public from potential future crimes. Discretion is one thing; whimsical "sentencing," is not what we expect from someone who is playing judge and jury.

When Sherlock Holmes covers up major crimes to protect reputations or avert scandal, he forfeits a bit of his moral authority. When he treats dispensing justice like a game, "playing tricks with the law"--"Hey, if Hopkins picks up on it, you're arrested, if not, c'est la vie!"--he loses the audiences trust a bit.

The game is afoot--but too often, it's because Holmes let them go himself.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**One theory that haven't seen get a lot of play is that maybe, just maybe, Theresa the maid is not an innocent in all this.

If you recall, it was Theresa whom Jack Croker first encounters in England, and it is from her that he learns of Brackenstall's (alleged?) cruel treatment of Mary. It was Theresa's tales that "nearly drove him mad." It was from Theresa that Croker "learned the ways of the household." It was no doubt Theresa who arranged the initial meeting of Jack and Mary, if not all of them.

And when it came to the cover-up, well, "Theresa was as cool as ice, and it was her plot as much as mine." Pretty telling, that.

Theresa hated Sir Eustace, especially after he threw a decanter at her head (if that happened). Her mistress stood to become quite wealthy should anything befall him. And she seems to have been a prime mover in getting all our players to the same place at the crucial time. Was she trying to mastermind a justifiable homicide?!?

**"Watson, you are a British jury, and I never met a man who was more eminently fitted to represent one."

Well, hold on now, Sherlock. Not that Watson isn't quite the wonderful chap. But he is your best friend and biographer, and always seems inclined to believe whatever theory you put forth. Somehow I don't think that he can be impartial in any matter where you're playing both judge and prosecutor.

Indeed, Watson may very well not be impartial when it comes to Lady Brackenstall, either. Some have commented that Holmes might have been hoodwinked by her charms. But read Watson's description of their first meeting, and you tell me if you think he could be a fair "jury" for her:

Seldom have I seen so graceful a figure, so womanly a presence, and so beautiful a face. She was a blonde, golden-haired, blue-eyed, and would no doubt have had the perfect complexion which goes with such colouring...

Vox populi, vox dei? Watson seems a little too smitten, methinks, to make that conclusion.

**British editions spelled the captain's name "Crocker;" American versions went with "Crocker."

**Again, the message come through loud and clear: don't marry someone from one of the colonies. America, Australia...their women are nothing but trouble!!

**More great imagery from Sir Arthur's pen:

The first faint winter's dawn was beginning to appear, and we could dimly see the occasional figure of an early workman as he passed us, blurred and indistinct in the opalescent London reek.

"The opalescent London reek"?? Such delicious stuff...

**As Holmes and Watson peruse Hopkins' note on the train: "We are moving in high life, Watson, crackling paper, 'E.B.' monogram, coat-of-arms..."

Wait a minute!! Did Hopkins post a letter on Sir Eustace's own stationary, rather than send a telegram? Wouldn't the latter have been faster (especially after midnight?) If the former, didn't Hopkins have any paper of his own to write on?

Purloining the stationery of a murder victim, Hopkins? That is...well, unseemly?

**Holmes declares that "Hopkins has called me in 7 times." Assuming he's not counting this very incident, we've seen 3 of those cases (if you consider Hopkins referring a client to Holmes in The Missing Three Quarter)...what were the other 4 cases? Tell us, Watson!!

**Once again, Sir Arthur has fun using Holmes to critique Watson's writing. So Doyle is actually having his most famous creation mock his own writing!

I must admit, Watson, that you have some power of selection, which atones for much which I deplore in your narratives. Your fatal habit of looking at everything from the point of view of a story instead of as a scientific exercise has ruined what might have been an instructive and even classical series of demonstrations. You slur over work of the utmost finesse and delicacy, in order to dwell upon sensational details which may excite, but cannot possibly instruct, the reader."

We'll see Sherlock's own writing up of his cases soon enough, and see how well his critique bears up...

**Mary: "I was brought up in the freer, less conventional atmosphere of South Australia, and this English life, with its proprieties and its primness, is not congenial to me."

Well, the English don't condone murder, if that's what you mean...or meeting with strange men who come in through your window in the middle of the night...

More seriously, it would be of interest to hear which proprieties and primnesses were not so congenial to her. She's certainly prim enough to condemn her husband's drinking...

**"Sir Eustace was a confirmed drunkard. To be with such a man for an hour is unpleasant. Can you imagine what it means for a sensitive and high-spirited woman to be tied to him for day and night?"

Well, that's a bit of a humble brag, isn't it? Calling herself sensitive and high-spirited?

But more seriously, was none of this evident before the marriage? There were 6 months between their meeting and the wedding. Did he never get "half-drunk" during their courtship or engagement? Did he hide it? Did he manage not to burn dogs or throw glassware at servants or stab people for the whole period? Did he abstain from liquor whenever he was going to be with he for half a year?

**Mary again: "It is a sacrilege, a crime, a villainy to hold that such a marriage is binding. I say that these monstrous laws of yours will bring a curse upon the land--God will not let such wickedness endure."

Doyle was a strong advocate for reforming these draconian divorce laws, and this certainly sounds like a bit of proselytizing for changes.

**Sir Eustace was said to have come at the burglars "with his favourite blackthorn cudgel in his hand."

His favourite? He had more than one blackthorne cudgel? He had them ranked?

**When the mystery begins to look like an open and shut case, Watson notes that Sherlock begins to look like "an abstruse and learned specialist who finds that he has been called in for a case of measles would experience something of the annoyance which I read in my friend's eyes."

Is this Watson snidely attacking specialists, too annoyed with their higher studies to help the commonplace ill? Maybe even Sir Arthur sticking it to his own profession?

**Holmes, examining the ground outside the windows where the burglars allegedly came in, and where Jack Croker did actually center from:"There are no signs here, but the ground is iron hard, and one would not expect them."

Again, remember when Holmes gave Hopkins crap for such a lackluster analysis of the ground in Black Peter?

My good Hopkins, I have investigated many crimes, but I have never yet seen one which was committed by a flying creature. As long as the criminal remains upon two legs so long must there be some indentation, some abrasion, some trifling displacement which can be detected by the scientific searcher..

So, detective, heal thyself?!?

**Self-analysis from Sherlock: "Perhaps, when a man has special knowledge and special powers like my own, it rather encourages him to seek a complex explanation when a simpler one is at hand."

Watson should have shown us such a tale, at some point. Holmes coming up with an amazing theory of the crime, and it turns out to be pretty simple...

**Holmes again, on why you should never take seemingly innocent but out-of-place details lightly:

Every instinct that I possess cries out against it. It's wrong--it's all wrong--I'll swear that it's wrong. And yet the lady's story was complete, the maid's corroboration was sufficient, the detail was fairly exact. What have I to put up against that? Three wine-glasses, that is all. But if I had not taken things for granted, if I had examined everything with the care which I should have shown had we approached the case DE NOVO and had no cut-and-dried story to warp my mind, should I not then have found something more definite to go upon? Of course I should.

In other words, don't let "eyewitness" testimony influence you too much, especially when they might be lying...

**Interesting fact about Victorian burglars: "As a matter of fact, burglars who have done a good stroke of business are, as a rule, only too glad to enjoy the proceeds in peace and quiet without embarking on another perilous undertaking."

See, that's why they never get rich. Do a job, lay around and live off the proceeds...then you're broke again, and have to go back into action.

Don't be layabouts, you potential burglars out there! Keep working until you have a sufficient nest egg! Burgle more often--every night if you must!--so you can take an extended vacation!

**Holmes explains why the three wine glasses matter so much:

But if I have hit upon the true explanation of this one small phenomenon, then in an instant the case rises from the commonplace to the exceedingly remarkable, for it can only mean that Lady Brackenstall and her maid have deliberately lied to us, that not one word of their story is to be believed, that they have some very strong reason for covering the real criminal, and that we must construct our case for ourselves without any help from them.

Yet, Holmes ultimately does construct his case with help from them, and believed the (second) story the conspirators gave, even though "not one word of their story is to be believed"! And he took Jack Croker's tale as verbatim truth, without a shred of evidence!

**Both Theresa and Jack seem pretty sure that Mary wed Sir Eustace just for the money.

Theresa: "He won her with his title and his money and his false London ways."

Jack: "Well, why shouldn't she marry whom she liked? Title and money--who could carry them better than she?"

I'm not saying at all that it justified any of the abuse. But seriously, if she didn't like the prim and proper English ways, than marrying a noble for his title and money isn't a recipe for happiness.

**Description of Jack from his shipping company: "[A] wild, desperate fellow off the deck of his ship--hot-headed, excitable..."

This is the guy you promote to captain?

Still, if this was his reputation, perhaps it means that Mary and/or Theresa knew he could be easily goaded into violence, and thus was the perfect patsy to set-up for a "crime of passion."

**"I believe you are a man of your word, and a white man, and I'll tell you the whole story."

Oh, Captain Jack, you racist bastard.

**Sir Eustace "called [Mary] the vilest name that a man could use to a woman."

Admit it, you're dying to know what that could be, circa 1897...

**Croker describing the end of the fight: "Then it was my turn, and I went through him as if he had been a rotten pumpkin. Do you think I was sorry? Not I!"

Wow. And this was the guy Holmes decided was worthy of mercy and a cover-up? If you want mercy from me, you probably should revel in needlessly graphic descriptions of your victim's death...

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE SECOND STAIN!

The Adventure Of The Missing Three Quarter--It's Not About The Sports, Silly

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 03 May 2015 12:00:00 +0000

An awful lot of people seem to think that The Adventure of The Missing Three Quarter is a mystery about sports (sorry, British fans--"sport."). That it's really just Silver Blaze, with a missing human in place of a missing horse.

And it's easy to see where folks might get that impression. The title of the story is a rugby term. Cyril Overton's initial telegram to Sherlock Holmes is couched in sports terms, and his introduction to Holmes is a long paragraph of sport jargon impenetrable to anyone not an avid rugby fan. Overton treats Holmes like a naive shut-in at his lack of awareness of the state of the rugby world.

The mystery is framed for us in terms of the build-up to the crucial "big game." One of the potential motives thrown about is the possibility of gamblers wanting to surreptitiously influence the outcome of that game.

And so, perhaps understandably, much of the commentary about this story seem focused on the rugby. They talk about whether of not a three quarter would really be needed to perform the tasks Overton describes; they discuss when and when the game would likely take place; they try and deduce the year from the score Watson gives; they discuss what kind of gambling there might have been; they discuss the (rapidly dying) amateurism of rugby. Even famed American sportswriter Red Smith, who infamously accused Holmes of chicanery in rigging the race in Silver Blaze for gambling profits, chimes in on this story: Holmes obviously dragged out the investigation so Staunton would miss the game, and Holmes could profit by wagering on Oxford!

But the sporting aspect is merely a distraction, a setting, and not what Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wanted to write about.

Note that in the course of the mystery, Holmes never once interviews any of Godfrey Staunton's teammates. He never talks to coaches or players on the other team. He never looks into the gambling aspect at all, never seeks out any of the wagering that was reputedly going on. He tells Watson that the game and/or gamblers are not likely explanations for the disappearance. We're given the score of the Big Game as a casual afterthought 2/3 of the way through the story, and the sporting aspect is never mentioned again.

This story would have been exactly the same had it been about a student vanishing before a big exam, or a nobleman vanishing before an important parliamentary vote. The sporting aspect is merely the window dressing, the aspic holing together the true ingredients of our story: love versus class obligations. Or to put it more sadly, how far a fine young man would go to hide his true love in order to secure an inheritance--love versus money.

It's quite a sad tale, actually. Staunton meets, and marries a woman "as good as she was beautiful and as intelligent as she was good." Sadly, though, she was "beneath his class." And despite the fact that "no man need be ashamed of such a wife," Staunton was certain that the marriage would cause his uncle Lord Mount-James--one of the richest men in England!-- to disinherit him. So Godfrey and his pal Dr. Armstrong conspired to keep the whole marriage secret--they told no one at all of the marriage, and kept the poor (unnamed!) girl in a "lonely cottage," apparently to be visited by her secret husband only when he could get away.

The story is sad and tawdry on a number of levels. You love your wife, but are so afraid of losing an inheritance, you keep her secret? Godfrey was "not fond" of his uncle, and would never go to see him "if he could help it"--yet he was still eager to left in the will of the man he so disliked. It's cruel to say so, but it is difficult to avoid feeling that the lad loved the possibility of the money more than he loved his wife.

The class issues are disturbing to modern ears, as well. The girl was the daughter of a "landlady," certainly middle class--but she was still considered beneath him? I'm never clear on the practices of British nobility, but Godfrey Staunton is never referred to by title. Is he noble? He is Lord Mount-James' only heir--would the title pass to him?

Allow me here, if not a full exoneration, than a least a partial defense of Mount-James. He is a miserly bastard, to be certain. But we never hear him say that poor marriage by Godfrey would lead to disinheritance. The Lord "knew little" of his nephew's private life, and certainly had no knowledge of this wedding. We only have the assertion of Dr. Armstrong that "it was quite certain that the news of his marriage would have been the end of his inheritance." Yet it clear that Armstrong didn't know Mount-James that well. He assumes that Holmes was hired by the noble skinflint; but as we saw when we met Mount-James, the nobleman cared not a whit about his nephew's life, and declared that he wouldn't spend a farthing to find Godfrey when he was missing--it seems certain that he would never have spared the pounds for private detectives of his own volition. So we only have a third-hand assumption of someone who was in no position to know that Godfrey's wedding would have resulted in disinheritance.

Nonetheless, the fact that Godfrey Staunton and Leslie Armstrong so believed that the three quarter would be deprived of his rightful bequest--and the fact that the unnamed wife was willing to play along with the farce--is indicative of the stranglehold that such class considerations had on the behaviors and imaginations of the people of the era. The certainty that any relationship which threatened class boundaries would be punished led to terribly unhealthy actions--the denial of love, the hiding and suppressing of emotions (and relationships)--elaborate hypocrisies that were almost certainly worse than the "crimes" they were designed to hide.

Still, as much as a victim of the social structures of the time as Godfrey was, I don't think we can completely absolve him of blame, can we? I would certainly like to think that, were I faced with such a choice, I would say, "To hell with the bequest," and publicly marry my true love. I hope that I would, anyway. Yet Staunton was so afraid of the truth getting out, that even when his wife was terribly ill, "he had to go to London to play this match, for he could not get out of it without explanations which would expose his secret."

Yet why the lust for that money? Staunton may have been "of modest means," but he was a Cambridge student, which indicates he likely had some opportunities ahead of him. If he was as good at rugby as Overton averred, the days of professionalism in the sport were very close, and he should have made a fine living. He had wealthy friends (Dr. Armstrong lived in "a large mansion"), who were willing to help him conceal the wedding--wouldn't they have been likely to help him had Mount-James disowned him? He had a "lonely cottage"--surely he could have just as easily afforded the same if his secret were revealed. And he could afford a medical bill for thirteen guineas paid to his friend the doctor.

We know precious little about Staunton and his finances, so we shouldn't be too judgmental. But at least on the surface, we could read this tale as the story of a man who loved his wife, but was too enchanted by the possibility of great wealth to be happy with her and a more modest income.

[In fairness, it's certainly possible that the unnamed wife was just as interested in the inheritance, perhaps even more so than Staunton. The entire scheme may have even been her idea, for all we know. Another reason not to judge Godfrey too harshly based upon the little information we're given.]

So, no, The Adventure Of The Missing Three Quarter had nothing to do with rugby, despite everyone's focus upon that aspect of it. The story is, instead, a love tragedy. It is a Romeo And Juliet story where a secret wedding is made not to protect the young people from a family feud, but to ensure a large estate. It is a story where fear of being discovered marrying outside of one's class leads to unnatural acts, and end in tragedy (although we cannot say that hiding the wife away caused her tuberculosis, having to keep her hidden away in a remote cottage, unvisited by actual practicing physicians --"Armstrong is not really a doctor in practice."--surely didn't aid in any possible recovery). It is the tales of a young man so obsessed with keeping a bequest from a man he barely knew and couldn't stand, that he had to forgo most of the experience of living with the woman he loved.

And that's a lot more important than any rugby game, now matter how big.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**Obviously, the "marry outside your class" could still apply today, although it's a much more subtle phenomenon these days. So if anyone wanted to do a modernization of this story, perhaps they could have Staunton in a secret gay marriage. I do know people who have been disowned for such relationships, sadly...

**While my knowledge of rugby is precisely nil, I feel confident in saying that if your chances of victory depend entirely on one player being present, you might want to do a better job of recruiting (and coaching).

**I am not one of those who suggests that the team is more important than anything, that a player should somehow grin and bear it through personal emergencies rather than miss the big game.

But still, when he left to go be with his dying wife, he should have at least left a note, or sent a telegram, or something. People were depending upon him, and the "vanish without any word for three days" really isn't acceptable. Even a "Sorry, personal emergency, gotta bail--sorry" note would have been better than no word at all.

**So, if Lord Mount-James did decide to disinherit Staunton over his marriage, to whom would the money go? It's hard to see someone as miserly as him leaving all his fortune to charity...

**I don't usually play this game, but a case could be argued that Doctor Armstrong was the true villain of the piece.

Holmes praises his intellect and his skill, comparing him with Moriarty!

Perhaps that comparison was more apt than we know. We've already seen that 100% of what we know about the potential of Mount-James disinheriting Staunton came from Armstrong, and we've discussed how that seems to be a complete misreading of the miser: Mount-James cared little for Godfrey's private life, and seems terribly unlikely to have hired private detectives to investigate him.

Well, what if the concern for that bequest came from Armstrong? What if the whole idea to keep the wedding secret came form Armstrong? The "keep your wife in a secret cottage near me, and live a secret double life" idea--what if it were an idea by Armstrong to manipulate his "intimate" friend? To make Godfrey more dependent upon him, so when Mount-James died, Armstrong's newly rich best friend could funds his literary and scientific endeavors?Maybe Armstrong wasn't as wealthy as he seemed, and...

That might explain why, at the end, Armstrong so readily gave in to Sherlock's request to trust him, which Armstrong had so strongly ignored before--with the wife dead, and the marriage over, there was no longer a threat of Staunton being disowned.

Nah, I don't really believe that.

**Red Smith's calumny against Holmes, tongue-in-cheek or not, cannot go unanswered.

As he did for Silver Blaze, Smith accuses Sherlock of "stage-managing" these cases so that Holmes could make a bundle gambling on the event. He argues that Holmes "slow-footed" the investigation--being put off by a "windy bluff" from Armstrong, and tricked when he should have been able to follow the carriage easily--until after the Cambridge-Oxford match was over, so Holmes could use his knowledge that Staunton would be absent to place wagers on Oxford.

Hogwash.

The first thing to note is Holmes complete lack of knowledge on the sport--he doesn't even understand the most basic terminology of rugby. Yet he's supposedly able to suddenly have enough mastery of the sport to make intelligent bets based on one piece of information from a doubtless sincere but possibly overreacting coach?

Second, unlike in Silver Blaze, where Holmes insisted that the owner keep the horse entered, in this case Holmes insists that Overton assume that Staunton won't be coming back:

I should strongly recommend you to make your preparations for your match without reference to this young gentleman. It must, as you say, have been an overpowering necessity which tore him away in such a fashion, and the same necessity is likely to hold him away.

In other words, unlike Silver Blaze, the word would quickly get out that Godfrey would not be playing, and the odds in favor of Oxford would have quickly risen, negating any advantage that a man hoping to take advantage of the three quarter's absence. If Holmes was indeed planning to make a mint gambling on this case, he went about it in completely the wrong way.

Finally, even had Holmes made Armstrong break down with the truth, or successfully followed him the next day, Staunton would not have played! Holmes himself declared this, and the sight of Staunton prostrate before the corpse of his wife should make that very clear. Godfrey would not have left his dying wife to play in the game. Holmes' investigation, slow or not, made no difference whatsoever in what would have happened in the game. Stalling the investigation made would have been pointless--Holmes could have easily made those alleged bets before leaving London, and the outcome would have been the same.

That's what you get when try to look at Missing Three Quarter as a sport story, and try to use it to commit character assassination against the Great Detective. You come off looking like an idiot who hasn't even read the story...

**Watson: "We were fairly accustomed to receive weird telegrams at Baker Street."

Alright, there's a book I would read: "Come At Once: Telegrams Received At 221B Baker Street." Somebody get to work on this, please.

**Watson worried about the lack of business recently:

I knew by experience that my companion's brain was so abnormally active that it was dangerous to leave it without material upon which to work. For years I had gradually weaned him from that drug mania which had threatened once to check his remarkable career. Now I knew that under ordinary conditions he no longer craved for this artificial stimulus, but I was well aware that the fiend was not dead but sleeping, and I have known that the sleep was a light one and the waking near when in periods of idleness I have seen the drawn look upon Holmes's ascetic face, and the brooding of his deep-set and inscrutable eyes.

This is the first we've heard about Sherlock's drug use in quite awhile. It's interesting, because none of Watson's prior descriptions of Holmes' habit sounded this dire. "Threatened once to check his remarkable career"?

Is Watson exaggerating here...or had he been downplaying how bad things were in earlier tales?

**Apocryphal case: "...there was Henry Staunton, whom I helped to hang..."

**Cyril Overton does a great job of trying to make Holmes feel ashamed for not knowing more about sports: "Why, Mr. Holmes, I thought you knew things." "Good Lord! Mr. Holmes, where HAVE you lived?"

Of course, everyone thinks that everybody else should be familiar with their favorite activity. I can imagine a modern story with a client pillorying Holmes for not being more familiar with Game Of Thrones...

**I really don't have any dog in the "did Sherlock go to Oxford or Cambridge" arguments.

But from my disinterested viewpoint, this story sure make it look like Holmes isn't terribly familiar with Cambridge. He tells Watson that they are "stranded and friendless in this inhospitable town." And he doesn't seem to be terribly familiar with the geography of the area.

If you went by this story alone, you might have to conclude he was an Oxfordian.

**Holmes, as per usual, picks out the important clues of the case, whilst everyone else focuses on trivia. Sherlock evaluates each theory in terms of the visit from the unknown man and the telegram:

...this young man saw a formidable danger which approached him, and from which someone else could protect him. 'US,' mark you! Another person was involved. Who should it be but the pale-faced, bearded man, who seemed himself in so nervous a state? What, then, is the connection between Godfrey Staunton and the bearded man? And what is the third source from which each of them sought for help against pressing danger? Our inquiry has already narrowed down to that."

And Watson proves that he is indeed becoming more adept at the detective's methods, as he notes that all of the potential theories fail to take the telegram into account.

**"Holmes: "As you have no doubt frequently observed, Watson, the impression usually goes through--a fact which has dissolved many a happy marriage."

A lesson to all adulterers--don't write in pencil, and throw away the blotter paper!

**It seems that telecommunications companies in the Victorian era weren't any better at protecting clients' data from snoopers, As Holmes rather effortlessly gets the original telegram from the station office. "There is so much red tape in these matters..." Not for Sherlock Holmes!

Indeed, he has obviously put a large amount of thought into ways to beat the system: "I had seven different schemes for getting a glimpse of that telegram..." You're a regular NSA, Sherlock!

**Watson's first description of Lord Mount-James:

...a queer little old man, jerking and twitching in the doorway. He was dressed in rusty black, with a very broad-brimmed top-hat and a loose white necktie--the whole effect being that of a very rustic parson or of an undertaker's mute...

One delicious detail highlighting his stinginess: "I came round as quickly as the Bayswater bus would bring me." One of the wealthiest men in England, and he took the public bus instead of a cab...

**Watson seems very impressed by Leslie Amrstrong:

...a thinker of European reputation in more than one branch of science...the square, massive face, the brooding eyes under the thatched brows, and the granite moulding of the inflexible jaw. A man of deep character, a man with an alert mind, grim, ascetic, self-contained, formidable...

**This is the second story in a row to discuss other private detectives. Clearly, they were far more prominent in 1904 than 1886. And they didn't seem to have too fine a reputation, according to Armstrong:

Where your calling is more open to criticism is when you pry into the secrets of private individuals, when you rake up family matters which are better hidden, and when you incidentally waste the time of men who are more busy than yourself.

Of course, Armstrong did have a bit of a stick up his butt, so it's not clear that the general public would share that opinion.

Then again, given the famous British reserve and expectation of privacy, private dicks may not have been well thought of by the general public. Yet, people had to have somewhere to turn when Holmes turned down their case and the police weren't interested...

**Armstrong says he recognizes Holmes' name, but does not really seem that familiar with the detective's reputation:

"I have heard your name, Mr. Sherlock Holmes, and I am aware of your profession--one of which I by no means approve."

"In that, Doctor, you will find yourself in agreement with every criminal in the country," said my friend, quietly.

"So far as your efforts are directed towards the suppression of crime, sir, they must have the support of every reasonable member of the community, though I cannot doubt that the official machinery is amply sufficient for the purpose."

As we have seen, of course, and as has been well reported in the press, Holmes has been quite celebrated for solving cases which "the official machinery" is not "amply sufficient." But perhaps Dr. Armstrong has been far more focused on his lectures and treatises...

**Holmes, the great cover-up specialist: "I have already told you that I can hush up that which others will be bound to publish."

Except, of course, when Watson publishes it...

**Given that Armstrong calms the hell down as soon as Sherlock says "I am not employed by Lord Mount-James, and that my sympathies in this matter are entirely against that nobleman," one wonders why Sherlock didn't bring that up far earlier.

Dr. Armstrong dropped off a note to Holmes. Perhaps a simple reply not-- "I don't work for Mount-James"--could have spared us a lot of running around.

Then again, it's possible that Armstrong finally relented because the marriage no longer existed to cover up. It does seem an awfully quick 180 degree turn by him, though.

**Pompey!!

My friend Dawn hates Sherlock Holmes, but she likes dogs. So this picture is for her.

**Stylistically, we have a return to earlier Holmes stories, with an incredibly abrupt ending, leaving us no information whatsoever about what happens to our characters in the future. What becomes of Staunton? Does he rejoin the team? Does the wedding become public knowledge? Does he get the estate?

Would it have killed you to give us an extra sentence or two, Sir Arthur?

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE ABBEY GRANGE!!

The Adventure Of The Golden Pince-Nez--How NOT To Adapt A Holmes Story!!

noreply@blogger.com (snell) — Sun, 19 Apr 2015 12:00:00 +0000

I have nothing but sympathy for those trying to adapt stories from one medium to another. There are a near-infinite number of choices that must be made-what to include, what to discard, what to expand upon, what to elide past, how to stretch or squeeze to fit the available time slot. It's a thankless, difficult task, and adapters rarely get enough credit.

Adaptation can be especially tricky when it comes to Sherlock Holmes stories. 80% of the tales, it seems, begin with Holmes or Watson sitting around Baker Street, when a client or policeman comes in to make a huge exposition dump. Not necessarily the most engaging thing to put on film, so adapters have to be clever to avoid the first third of their show merely being talking heads. There's also the problem of Watson being a humble narrator--many of the written adventures have him being nearly silent, with all of the best lines going to Holmes. Making Watson an actual character in an adaptation requires a bit of work. Add in the fact that some of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's short stories do not seem to have enough content to fill 50+ minutes, and you'll see that adapting the Canon is usually much more involved than "just filming the story."

That being said, there are a number of missteps that can clear be labeled missteps, clear mistakes that detract from the adaptation and make it far weaker than the original story. Which brings us to The Adventure Of The Golden Pince-Nez.

The Granada adaptations, by and large, do an excellent job of translating the Canon to the small screen. But--as is almost inevitable in doing so many stories--sometimes they make choices that are baffling, that seem (to me) to actually hurt the story they're trying to portray. And in Golden Pince-Nez, they seem to make every bad choice possible, turning what is a nice little Holmes mystery into a sloppy show that diminishes the detective and takes away the most intriguing part of the mysteries.

Granada starts with an odd cold open. Now, it is not unusual for them to have taken the murder or burglary from a story, and show that as the opening scene. That's usually defensible--it makes a gripping, interesting way to bring the viewer into the story, and breaks up the potential monotony of talking heads merely dumping exposition about the crime at Baker Street.

But in this case, Granada makes an awful decision. They choose to start with a scene of tsarist police bloodily breaking up a protest in Russia, and show Anna being arrested, and show a close-up of her glasses.

Why they do this is inexplicable, at least to me. The fact that this story is (once again) the result of foreign intrigues come London is kept hidden from the reader until the very end of the story. When Anna declares, "He is not an Englishman. He is a Russian," the reader is surprised. The viewer is not, because they have already been told that the story involves Russians, and no one else in the story can credibly be Russian. Why spoil the big reveal with the opening Russia scene?

Furthermore, by focusing on Anna and her glasses in that opening, Granada has sort of spoiled the mystery. No matter how many red herring suspects with pince-nez glasses they trot out, they've already told the viewer that the mystery must revolve around this woman, and a Russian connection!

The next problem is not entirely Granada's fault. Edward Hardwicke was unavailable to play Watson for this episode. Well, of course Sherlock needs someone to talk to, so they chose to have Charles Gray reprise his role as Mycroft for the story.

In and of itself, that is a practical and wise decision. And they do add a nice bit where Sherlock and Mycroft play "dueling deductions" over the pince-nez. However, for reasons that I once again do not understand, they decide to have Mycroft steal Sherlock's thunder in the episode, and have him solve the mystery!

In the original story, Holmes has already deduced that the killer must be concealed behind one of the bookcases. So he smokes "cigarette after cigarette"--a "great number," in his own description--and sprinkled the ash all over the floor. Why? So that when Anna came out during his absence, Holmes could tell from the disturbed ashes exactly where her hiding place was.

But in the Granada version, Sherlock does not know where Anna is hiding. He smokes one cigarette, as a courteous guest. Mycroft makes the deduction, and he surreptitiously spreads his snuff all over the floor. Later, he hands Sherlock his empty snuff case, telling his brother that he might find it useful--and it is only later that Sherlock realizes what Mycroft has done, and what it means! While Mycroft is the smarter brother, surely we're not tuning in to watch him solve crimes instead of his brother!

Another problem the Granada production has is to tar the character of Willoughby Smith for the purpose of providing a string of red herrings.

We're told from the first that the vexing part of the case for Inspector Hopkins is that there was "no motive...no reason on Earth why anyone should wish him harm." His investigation of Smith's background show that the young man "had nothing against him" with "no weak spot in him at all."

This isn't some minor point. Given the limited availability of physical forensics available in the day, "motiveless" crimes could be very difficult for the police to solve. In terms of the fiction, this is why they needed Holmes to come help them. And it's the basis of the beginning of Holmes' deductive chain--the lack of motive, along with the choice of weapon, told him that the murder was not planned, and that Smith was an innocent bystander in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Granada, however, decided that they had to throw lots of red herrings out there, to make us believe that there was motive to murder Willoughby Smith. First, they tell us that he was pitching woo and pledging eternal love to the young maid, Susan. Not only that, but he was cheating on her. He was making time with, and actual proposed to, local suffragette leader Abagail Crosby (who was created out of whole cloth for the adaptation). Susan witnessed this, supposedly giving her motive to murder Smith. And we also see Smith being disdainful of the suffrage cause, and striking Abagail when she refused to stop her activities. So now she had a motive to murder him. And Crosby had a pair of pince-nez!!

We get to waste a great deal of time in the Granada version with Hopkins having to interview these two ladies, trying to get them to admit they committed the murder. This is foolish on two levels. First of all, because they opened the story in Russia, the audience knows that the killing and the glasses had to have something to do with foreign intrigue. So we know that these people had nothing to do with the killing--you've already told us that!!

Secondly, this makes Inspector Hopkins' earlier investigations look shockingly incompetent. After declaring that there was not any possible motive, and not a single possible spot against Smith, who "knew nobody in the neighbourhood" and "existed only for the work,", the production tells us Smith was actually a two-timing woman-beater (who hates suffrage, to boot!). How could Hopkins have possibly missed all of that? By changing Smith's character so radically, this adaptation undermines any faith we might have had in Hopkins as a student of Holmes' methods!

Granada also changes Professor Coram's motivations, once again bafflingly, and not for the better. In Russia, he and Anna were "reformers--revoluntionists--Nihilists!" When a police officer was killed, he turned on his comrades, confessing to save himself and get a great reward.

But there was another reason--Anna had a boyfriend in the Order. Anna describes Alexis as "the friend of my heart. He was noble, unselfish, loving--all that my husband was not." I think we can take that as Victorian code for having an affair of the heart, at the very least. And the implication seems clear that jealously of the older husband for the relationship between his much younger wife and her work buddy that caused him to hide exculpatory evidence and "tr[y] hard to swear away the young man's life." That makes sense--he wanted Alexis imprisoned or killed as retaliation for whatever was going on between the non-violent revolutionary and his wife.

So it is truly odd that Granada changes Alexis from "the friend of Anna's heart"...to her brother! Well, that removes the jealousy motive (unless we're implying that something pretty icky was going on, at least in Sergius' mind). So, why, exactly, would he lie and conceal evidence to keep Alexis unjustly in jail? Did Coram bear a grudge against Alexis for some reason? We get absolutely zero explanation--Anna's exposition is essentially the same in the adaptation as in the novel--except that Alexis is now her brother, and Sergius stole the diary and letters for no particular reason.

Finally, and not of such great consequence: in the adaptation, a member of the Brotherhood comes in through the skylight and slays Coram in the very last scene! In the story, he survives, as far as we know. Anna had promised not to betray his secret, and there is no indication that Holmes or Hopkins did so. Yet in the Granada version, an extremely scruffy Nihilist is seen spying on the professor throughout the story. Did Anna tell them, despite her promise? Had they been following her during her search for her husband? Certainly, it's not too significant a change, but it does serve to weaken Anna's character. Now, we must conclude that either she was a liar, or so foolish that she didn't realize she she was indeed sentencing Sergius to death. She is stripped of some of her agency, and her nobility that made her so appealing next to the craven professor.

So what do we have? Several small amendments to the story, which in a mere listing may not seem much. But upon closer examination, and taken cumulatively, they seriously weaken the tale. The surprise reveal of the mystery is ruined. Sherlock is made to look an inferior detective. The mystery of a motiveless crime is eliminated by trying desperately to create red herrings, and in the process turning Willoughby Smith into a monstrous cad. Coram loses his motive to keep Alexis imprisoned. And Anna is made to look weaker by her inability to keep her pledge not to betray Coram.

As I said above, adaptation is hard, and I don't expect one to adhere slavishly to the original. But in almost every unnecessary decision they made this time, director Peter Hammond and screenwriter Gary Hopkins decided poorly, and as a result, they did little justice to The Adventure of The Golden Pince-Nez.

OTHER TRIFLES AND OBSERVATIONS:

**Kvetching about the Granada version aside, this is a pretty good tale.

Sure, with over a century of mystery hindsight, the "victim wasn't really the target" may seem a little trite today. But at the time it was a pretty good gimmick.

Holmes is in top form, not allowing himself to be distracted by false theories and irrelevancies, and seeing what should have been obvious to Hopkins very quickly.

And of course, there's all the smoking...

**Admit it--when you first saw the title of this story, you had absolutely no idea of what a pince-nez was, let alone a golden one. I admit my ignorance...

**Watson tell us of "three massive manuscript volumes which contain our work for 1894." Three massive volumes!! And you've given us only a dribble, Doctor! Get writing!!

**This story is the mother lode for those fascinated by references to apocryphal stories:

I see my notes upon the repulsive story of the red leech and the terrible death of Crosby, the banker. Here also I find an account of the Addleton tragedy, and the singular contents of the ancient British barrow. The famous Smith-Mortimer succession case comes also within this period, and so does the tracking and arrest of Huret, the Boulevard assassin--an exploit which won for Holmes an autograph letter of thanks from the French President and the Order of the Legion of Honour.

We've seen several other references of cases that Holmes has done for the French government in this period...did they have him on retainer?

**Watson (& Doyle!) waxing poetic about the weather:

It was strange there, in the very depths of the town, with ten miles of man's handiwork on every side of us, to feel the iron grip of Nature, and to be conscious that to the huge elemental forces all London was no more than the molehills that dot the fields.

Sir Arthur never gets enough credit for Watson's descriptive narration, and the wonderful turns of phrase used so often.

**A slam on journalism, as Hopkins disdains the paper's coverage: "Well, it was only a paragraph, and all wrong at that, so you have not missed anything."

Given what we know of the case, how much could they have gotten wrong? Did they name the wrong victim? The wrong address? Did they spell Hopkins' name wrong, so he's in a snit?

**Hopkins describing who lives at Yoxley Old Place: "was taken by an elderly man, who gave the name of Professor Coram."

Well, that's an odd turn of phrase. You usually wouldn't say "this person gave his name as X" unless you were already suspicious that that wasn't his real name, would you? If someone asked you who lived at 221B Baker Street, you probably wouldn't say, "Well, he gave the name of Sherlock Holmes."

Did Hopkins already suspect that Coram was an assumed identity? Nothing else in the story would suggest that. Was that phraseology more common back in 1894? Or did Doyle accidentally tip off the story's twist?

**"At first the maid thought that young Smith was already dead, but on pouring some water from the carafe over his forehead..."

Was that standard first aid procedure in the day? To pour water on the face? Not checking for a heartbeat, staunching the bleeding, elevating the wound? Nope--throw water on their forehead!

And if she thought Smith was dead, why was she pouring water on his face, anyway? An emergency baptism?!?

**Honest confession--when I first read the story, I was certain that Professor Coram was faking being an invalid. And he sometimes went out dressed as a woman. That would explain Smith's dying words: "The professor,' he murmured--'it was she.'" It would also explain how the killer "got away"--it was the professor, and he just went back into his room.

Yeah, I was wrong. But you have to admit, it was a fairly cool theory...

**Holmes continues to poke at Hopkins' competence fairly mercilessly: "What did you do, Hopkins, after you had made certain that you had made certain of nothing?"

Perhaps that is actually a sign of Holmes regard for Hopkins potential--he holds the young man to a higher standard...

**Then again, perhaps Hopkins IS a terrible detective:

There were some papers of importance in the cupboard, but there were no signs that this had been tampered with

But there had obviously been some tampering--the scratch on the metal was fresh, and the flecks of varnish were still present, which means the scratch had to have happened after the last time the maid dusted--just a quarter hour before the murder! How could Hopkins have missed this?!?

Really, if Hopkins truly considered himself a student of Holmes' methods, then based on this outing, he's not going to get a very good grade.

**Holmes description of Anna, based merely on her glasses:

Wanted, a woman of good address, attired like a lady. She has a remarkably thick nose, with eyes which are set close upon either side of it. She has a puckered forehead, a peering expression, and probably rounded shoulders. There are indications that she has had recourse to an optician at least twice during the last few months. As her glasses are of remarkable strength, and as opticians are not very numerous, there should be no difficulty in tracing her.

As many have pointed out, just because the glasses are relatively expensive, it does not automatically translate that the owner is currently well-to-do. Especially given the evidence that the owner had gone to the trouble to repair them (twice) rather than replace them. Compare, for example, the case of Henry Baker and his precious hat in Blue Carbuncle...

**Holmes again instantly seeing what others should have seen long before he became involved: "The idea of murder was not in her mind, or she would have provided herself with some sort of weapon, instead of having to pick this knife off the writing-table."

**Watson's description of Coram:

I have seldom seen a more remarkable-looking person. It was a gaunt, aquiline face which was turned towards us, with piercing dark eyes, which lurked in deep hollows under overhung and tufted brows. His hair and beard were white, save that the latter was curiously stained with yellow around his mouth. A cigarette glowed amid the tangle of white hair, and the air of the room was fetid with stale tobacco smoke.

Watson almost makes him out to be Gandalf: "He was, indeed, a weird figure as he turned his white mane and his glowing eyes towards us."

**Watson says that Coram had "a curious little mincing accent."Obviously he was trying to hide his native Russian accent.

It should be noted that "mincing accent" was a fairly common usage at the time, usually referring to the perceived "sing-song" accents of East Indians and other Asians attempting to speak the Queen's English. Some speech books of the day also referred to Cockneys has having a "mincing accent."

**So, Professor Coram smokes. A lot. An awful lot:

He sends me a thousand at a time, and I grieve to say that I have to arrange for a fresh supply every fortnight.

If we take that as literally true, that equates to more than 70 cigarettes per day!! If he sleeps 8 hours a day, that's more than 4 cigarettes per hour, all day long!

Even if we allow for casual conversational rounding, and perhaps self-deprecating exaggeration, that's still one hell of a lot of cigarettes. And they're all unfiltered!!

**The smoking, of course, allowed Holmes' ploy with the ashes:

I observed that he was smoking with extraordinary rapidity. "I am a connoisseur," said he, taking another cigarette from the box--his fourth--and lighting it from the stub of that which he had finished consuming cigarette after cigarette.

Here's the thing, though--were there no ashtrays in those days? I mean, even if he's your guest, wouldn't you notice/mention that a guy is just dumping the ash from a dozen cigarettes all over your carpet?

Or was that the accepted practice in the household? The maids must have a lot of fun cleaning the place...

**Corams description of his maid: "Susan is a country girl," said he, "and you know the incredible stupidity of that class."

Of course, Coram is trying to get the detectives to ignore the girl's evidence, so he has ample motive to try and get them to discount what she heard.

Still, it's amazingly rude. I guess reformed Nihilists can still be obnoxious class snobs...

**Wonderful observation/deduction by Holmes: "Ah! But it kills the appetite." And yet he ate all of his meals...

**Tipping the cigarette case is an old ploy that Holmes has used as a distraction many time before. Tipping over the vase in the Reigate Squires is another example...

**Watson on Anna 's first appearance:

Her face, too, was streaked with grime, and at the best she could never have been handsome, for she had the exact physical characteristics which Holmes had divined, with, in addition, a long and obstinate chin. And yet, in spite of all these disadvantages, there was a certain nobility in the woman's bearing--a gallantry in the defiant chin and in the upraised head, which compelled something of respect and admiration.

Yet Watson doesn't do very well as a doctor here. Despite obvious signs that she's under some fairly serious distress, it is Sherlock, not John, who notices something is amiss: "I fear that you are far from well."

Even when she "had turned a dreadful colour, the more ghastly under the dark dust-streaks upon her face," Watson doesn't seem able to perceive that something is seriously wrong, let alone attempt to diagnose her malady.

**Once again, foreign intrigues have come to London to settle matters in a deadly fashion. Seriously, why the hell did Britain ever allow immigrants in, given all the trouble they cause in the Canon?

**OK, here's the big problem with our mystery.

The sequence of events: Anna sneaks into the house and steals the letters & diary. Willoughby Smith stumbles in while she's doing it, and she accidentally kills him trying to escape. She accidentally flees down the wrong corridor, and end's up in the professor's room. She threatens him--"hide me or I'll tell the Brotherhood where you are." He complies, going to great length to hide her.

But couldn't Anna have cut out all those middle steps? Rather than the break in and the struggle and the hurried misguided flight, couldn't she have just openly gone to the professor to begin with, and said "give me the letters or I'll tell the Brotherhood where you are"? We've already seen that he was terrified of that outcome, and gave in to that threat even when it meant concealing a murderer. Wouldn't he have given in just as quickly if she had called on him during business hours, and made the same threat? No burglary or murder needed!!

Sure, she thought, "Yet I was sure that, with his revengeful nature, he would never give it to me of his own free-will." But he did give in to you, because of a simple extortion. Why wouldn't he have done the same initially?!?

**The second failed secretary being a private detective hired by Anna is rather a delicious detail, don't you think? It's too bad Doyle passed up on the opportunity to have Holmes comment on the quality/foibles of the contemporary "private detectives."

Still, we must ask, as he was already in the household, and had already made an impression of the key, why did the gumshoe decide that "he would not go further"?? Fear of breaking the law? He had already obtained for her an impression of the key and a floor plan and a diary of the household's movements, in full knowledge of what Anna intended to do with them. This private detective is surely guilty of being an accessory to the burglary. So why cop out before the actual theft?

Anna should have gone to Holmes instead of a private firm. He likely would have been sympathetic to her cause, and we've seen that he has fewer qualms about bending the law when he perceives that justice is at stake...

**Anna has, I think, a remarkably naive view of how the Russian government would react to these papers:

He wrote forever dissuading us from such a course. These letters would have saved him. So would my diary, in which, from day to day, I had entered both my feelings towards him and the view which each of us had taken.

Does anyone believe they would have commuted Alexis' sentence with this information? "Oh, he was a Nihilist who wanted to overthrow the Tsar, but he opposed violence--he wanted to bring down the royal family with peaceful means! We have no problem with that kind of free political expression! Let him go!"

I'm just saying, oppressive regimes usually aren't so reasonable when it comes to releasing dissidents.

Also, isn't it possible that those papers could end up implicating others who were involved in the Brotherhood but hadn't been caught? Just giving them to the Russians, without some serious study and perhaps editing, might not be wise.

Watson doesn't tell us the outcome of giving the letters and diary to the Russian embassy. But I'll wager that it wasn't a good outcome.

**Why did Anna bring poison?

I understand why she killed herself when she did--she didn't want to face the gallows or another long prison term.

But did she plan on getting caught?

There have been a couple of radio adaptations of the story, and in those she either shot herself or threw herself in front of a train. Obviously, just as not bringing a weapon showed she didn't intend to be an assassin, in those versions not bringing the poison showed she hadn't planned on dying.

We have to wonder--did she plan to poison Sergius? Poisoning his precious cigarettes, for example?

SHERLOCK HOLMES WILL RETURN IN--THE ADVENTURE OF THE MISSING THREE QUARTER!!