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Authors: Loren D. Estleman
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replaced the bottle of hallucinative with one my father used in his act. The original would have been useless. It had probably been there forty years.”
“That is precisely when Scrooge lived here,” reflected the earl.
“Well, Watson, what do you make of our little Yuletide adventure?”
The next morning was Christmas. After I had breakfasted and exchanged greetings and gifts with my wife, I paid a call upon Holmes in the old sitting-room, where I found him enjoying his morning pipe.
“I should say Bob Cratchit was fortunate there was no Sherlock Holmes in his day,” said I.
“Crafty fellows, these clerks. However, they are no match for a Lady Chislehurst. I perceive that package you are carrying is intended for me, by the way. The shops are closed, Mrs. Hudson is away visiting, and you know no one else in this neighbourhood.”
I handed him the bundle, wrapped in brown paper and tied with a cord.
“It is useless to try to surprise you, Holmes. It is a first-edition copy of
The Martyrdom of Man
, which you once recommended to me. I came across it in a secondhand shop in Soho.”
His expression was pleased, but I detected a cloud behind it. “Splendid, but I’d rather hoped it would be ‘A Christmas Carol.’ This adventure has demonstrated to me that I’ve fallen behind in my reading.”
It was with no small satisfaction that I reached into my coat pocket and handed him the story, bound in green calfskin with the title wreathed in gold.
He appeared nonplussed, a singular event.
“I am afraid, old fellow, that I have no gift to offer in return. The season has been busy, and as you know I allow little time for sentiment. It is disastrous to my work.”
It may have been my interpretation only, but he sounded apologetic. I smiled.
“My dear Holmes. What greater gift could I receive than the one you have given me these many years?”
He returned the smile. “Happy Christmas, Watson.”
“Happy Christmas, Holmes.”
THE RIDDLE OF
THE GOLDEN
MONKEYS
I t is a common misapprehension of old age that the widower is of necessity a lonely man even in the press of a crowd. In the third year of the reign of George V, I had been in bereavement for the better part of a decade, and the tragic inroads that had been made upon the British male population during the wars in South Africa and China were such that for a solitary gentleman in relatively good fettle to show himself in society was to trumpet his availability to any number of unattached women of a certain age.
This situation was exacerbated by the appearance, since the deaths of our gracious Victoria and that good-hearted man Edward VII, of a breed of bold, independent female who would step up and declare her intentions before a teeming ballroom with no more blushes than a tiger stalking a hare. The struggle for women’s suffrage and unstable conditions upon the Continent had stripped the gender of its traditional reserve.
By the summer of 1913, I had long since abandoned my shock at such behaviour, but I found it wearisome in the extreme. I had reached that time in life wherein a cigar, a snifter, and a good book quite fulfills one’s dreams of bliss. However, to confess to it in the presence of one of these daring creatures must needs give offence, and ultimately lead to the undoing of one’s good reputation, which in the end is all any of us ever has.
“I jumped—it seems,” writes Conrad, in
Lord Jim
. The declaration is appropriate to the action I took that June, when in response to frequent invitations I bolted London for the South Downs and a holiday from eligibility in the company of my oldest and closest friend.
Those who are familiar with my published recollections may remember that Sherlock Holmes, after a lifetime of unique service to the mighty and humble, had retired to an existence of contemplation and bee farming in Sussex. The setting was isolated, and in lieu of neighbours the modest villa looked out upon the brittle Channel
“That is precisely when Scrooge lived here,” reflected the earl.
“Well, Watson, what do you make of our little Yuletide adventure?”
The next morning was Christmas. After I had breakfasted and exchanged greetings and gifts with my wife, I paid a call upon Holmes in the old sitting-room, where I found him enjoying his morning pipe.
“I should say Bob Cratchit was fortunate there was no Sherlock Holmes in his day,” said I.
“Crafty fellows, these clerks. However, they are no match for a Lady Chislehurst. I perceive that package you are carrying is intended for me, by the way. The shops are closed, Mrs. Hudson is away visiting, and you know no one else in this neighbourhood.”
I handed him the bundle, wrapped in brown paper and tied with a cord.
“It is useless to try to surprise you, Holmes. It is a first-edition copy of
The Martyrdom of Man
, which you once recommended to me. I came across it in a secondhand shop in Soho.”
His expression was pleased, but I detected a cloud behind it. “Splendid, but I’d rather hoped it would be ‘A Christmas Carol.’ This adventure has demonstrated to me that I’ve fallen behind in my reading.”
It was with no small satisfaction that I reached into my coat pocket and handed him the story, bound in green calfskin with the title wreathed in gold.
He appeared nonplussed, a singular event.
“I am afraid, old fellow, that I have no gift to offer in return. The season has been busy, and as you know I allow little time for sentiment. It is disastrous to my work.”
It may have been my interpretation only, but he sounded apologetic. I smiled.
“My dear Holmes. What greater gift could I receive than the one you have given me these many years?”
He returned the smile. “Happy Christmas, Watson.”
“Happy Christmas, Holmes.”
THE RIDDLE OF
THE GOLDEN
MONKEYS
I t is a common misapprehension of old age that the widower is of necessity a lonely man even in the press of a crowd. In the third year of the reign of George V, I had been in bereavement for the better part of a decade, and the tragic inroads that had been made upon the British male population during the wars in South Africa and China were such that for a solitary gentleman in relatively good fettle to show himself in society was to trumpet his availability to any number of unattached women of a certain age.
This situation was exacerbated by the appearance, since the deaths of our gracious Victoria and that good-hearted man Edward VII, of a breed of bold, independent female who would step up and declare her intentions before a teeming ballroom with no more blushes than a tiger stalking a hare. The struggle for women’s suffrage and unstable conditions upon the Continent had stripped the gender of its traditional reserve.
By the summer of 1913, I had long since abandoned my shock at such behaviour, but I found it wearisome in the extreme. I had reached that time in life wherein a cigar, a snifter, and a good book quite fulfills one’s dreams of bliss. However, to confess to it in the presence of one of these daring creatures must needs give offence, and ultimately lead to the undoing of one’s good reputation, which in the end is all any of us ever has.
“I jumped—it seems,” writes Conrad, in
Lord Jim
. The declaration is appropriate to the action I took that June, when in response to frequent invitations I bolted London for the South Downs and a holiday from eligibility in the company of my oldest and closest friend.
Those who are familiar with my published recollections may remember that Sherlock Holmes, after a lifetime of unique service to the mighty and humble, had retired to an existence of contemplation and bee farming in Sussex. The setting was isolated, and in lieu of neighbours the modest villa looked out upon the brittle Channel
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