The Chronicles of Sherlock Holmes

by Paul Gilbert

  ‘Despite the all-pervading darkness, indeed there was not even a moon that night, I experienced no great difficulty in retracing my steps along the muddy track that leads up to The Willows. Furthermore the climb over the wall seemed even easier than it had been earlier that day. I dropped silently into the grounds and crept, as stealthily as I could, towards the house, from which no light was visible. From my earlier reconnoitre I recalled a small potting-shed set back and to the left side of the house. From this vantage point I was certain that I could survey the entire front of the house and thus observe any unexpected movement. I gained access to this outbuilding without any great difficulty and, upon satisfying myself as to the view that it afforded, I settled myself down for what I anticipated would be the rest of the night.

  ‘However, at approximately three o’clock in the morning, a light suddenly illuminated an upper room at the front of the house. The significance of this was clear. The man, whom I still assumed to be Maupertuis, had been alerted by Parker’s failure to return and was thus aware of the potential danger he now faced.

  ‘I immediately abandoned my hiding-place and crept towards a lower-floor sash window, which I easily prised open with my small jemmy. The room within which I now found myself appeared to be a small, over furnished parlour evidently thrown into a state of chaos by its owner’s preparations for an imminent departure. I picked my way carefully around the many objects strewn about that impeded my progress and silently opened the door that gave on to the front hallway.

  ‘The only visible light in the place came from the room that I had just noticed being illuminated from my vantage point outside. Though the light barely crept from under the door to that room, there was sufficient to reveal the staircase that led to it. I managed to gain the upper landing without alerting the room’s occupant and soon found myself standing breathlessly outside it, contemplating my immediate course of action.

  ‘The sound of rustling papers from within indicated to me that the person inside was not preparing to confront me. Then a familiar voice, cursing the name of the incapacitated Parker, immediately spurred me to action. I tested the handle to the door, which yielded. I threw back the door so vigorously that it crashed into the wall, and I strode purposefully into the room. As a precaution I locked the door behind me and then announced: ‘Good morning, Professor Moriarty!’

  ‘More surprised by the crash of the door than my announcement, I am sure, Moriarty slowly turned from the papers that he had been packing into an attaché-case, to face me. Almost unrecognizable in the guise of Maupertuis, certain unique physical traits betrayed him to me. No amount of facial hair could disguise the inherent evil of his cold, forbidding eyes. Nor could he still the peculiar, reptilian oscillation of his head, with which he was afflicted. His thin lips twisted into a peculiar smile.

  ‘“Ah, Mr Holmes, of course. I was a fool to think that my little deception would fool so astute a mind. However, I observe that you are alone, so perhaps my elaborate attempts at luring you to me were somewhat more successful.”

  ‘By now Moriarty and I were barely three feet apart and our eyes burned into each other’s, searching for signs of weakness. The excitement and anticipation of being so close to this epitome of evil, whom I had sought out for so long, were almost beyond my control. However I managed to deliver my response in a cold, disaffected manner.

  ‘“If you are referring to the clumsy attempt upon the life of my brother Mycroft, I must inform you now that it has also ended in abject failure. Your would-be assassin, Parker, I believe, was only successful in eliminating a hapless clerk!”

  ‘I was gratified to note that, upon hearing this news, his twisted smile soon faded and he turned away towards the window as he answered me.

  ‘“Your strange use of the word ‘also’ indicates that my theory regarding the loss of the Dying Gaul was sound. I deduced your meddling hand, at the outset, for my reasoning and planning were faultless.”

  ‘“Surely subsequent events have revealed that statement to be erroneous. Indeed it was merely bad timing that prevented you from falling into my hands at the villa in Tivoli,” I replied without realizing that while his back had been to me he had been extracting a small object from the pocket of his robe.

  ‘“So it is I who am supposed to have fallen into your hands?” Moriarty asked maliciously, turning round to face me once more. This time his right hand revealed his deadly response!

  ‘“It is no use. Your pistol changes nothing, Moriarty! Parker, your last accomplice, is now held in police custody, whilst my friend Dr Watson, together with Inspector Lestrade are, even now, beating a path to this very room. The net is closing upon you for the last time.” I stated with feigned bravado.

  ‘Then a change overtook his countenance, as if he knew that he could never face the ignominy of arrest, trial and the gallows. His eyes rolled up to the top of his head and he turned away from me once more.

  ‘“Oh, but Mr Holmes, for once at least you are to be proved incorrect. My pistol does indeed change things … most emphatically …” In an instant, before I could even visualize his intentions, Moriarty raised the pistol to his own head and fired a single shot, the deadly, bloody results of which you were witness to when you entered the room but a moment later.’

  ‘Good heavens, Sherlock! You came within a deuce of losing your life!’ Mycroft suddenly exclaimed.

  ‘Not for the first time, brother, not for the first time,’ Holmes wanly repeated.

  ‘Well, I do not know. I may be dealing with matters of international espionage, but I shall feel far safer within the confines of my office than I ever will in your place. Moreover, if I am to avoid the Prime Minister’s wrath I must repair to that institution without delay! Please thank your Scottish woman for her somewhat limited hospitality. I shall send my man for my belongings later on. Good day to you!’

  A moment or two later Lestrade followed Mycroft through the door and Holmes and I were left to our own devices.

  ‘Holmes?’ I ventured, once we had enjoyed a prolonged moment of reflective silence. ‘I could not help but notice that, despite your best efforts at disguising it, there is still something within you that regrets Moriarty’s passing.’

  Holmes slowly shook his head while relighting his cherrywood.

  ‘No Watson, no one in their right mind could possibly lament the elimination of pure evil, which Moriarty, for all his cleverness, surely was. As a perfectionist in my chosen profession, however, it is indeed hard to see how a challenge as stimulating as battling with Moriarty, will ever arise again.’

  ‘I can understand that,’ I responded, ‘but did you not say earlier that the weaknesses of man, which you have so astutely observed over the years, ensure that there will always be someone prepared to prey upon them. Surely it is gratifying to know that you will be there to prevent that from happening?’

  Holmes turned to me suddenly and smiled. ‘As ever you are quite right, Watson. Yet it is equally gratifying to know that you will be there, fighting by my side.’

  THE REMARKABLE DISAPPEARANCE OF JAMES PHILLIMORE

  ‘Among those unfinished tales is that of Mr James Phillimore who, stepping back into his own house to get his umbrella, was never more seen in this world …’

  (The Problem of Thor Bridge by A. Conan Doyle)

  There was a certain period of time whilst the new century was still in its infancy, when the capital was gripped by an atmosphere of stunned melancholy. Nation, Empire and populace tried to adapt to a world deprived of its revered monarch, now no longer looking down upon and protecting it. We all felt as if we had suffered a parental bereavement and only that long and bloody conflict in Southern Africa diverted us from our sense of loss and confusion.

  When I say all were affected, I do so while making one qualified exception, that of my friend and colleague, Sherlock Holmes. Had our new head of state been announced as Attila the Hun, as opposed to King Edward VII, Holmes would have suffered the succession with similar indiff
erence, for as long as he was continually fed on a diet of new and intriguing cases, these were his sole driving force and motivation. Without these he felt as if his intricately engineered mind would surely stagnate and destroy itself.

  The fact that the past few months had seen Holmes plagued by the longest dearth of work he had experienced throughout our entire association, made his customary melancholy all the deeper and darker.

  Deprived of the solace that his now conquered addiction to cocaine had once provided him with, Holmes’s frustrations became all the more obvious and disturbing. He had even added to the bullet holes already adorning our drawing room wall, a use I had never expected my old army revolver to be put to, and was causing both Mrs Hudson and myself great concern.

  With a view to alleviating my friend’s condition, when not in attendance at my surgery, I tirelessly scanned all the morning and evening newspapers in the hope of catching Holmes’s attention with stories of unusual crime and mystery. Holmes’s reaction was to snatch each and every journal from my grasp, crush them into a ball and hurl them on to the fire.

  ‘Really Holmes!’ I protested on one such occasion. ‘Your recent behaviour has become most insufferable. I understand and sympathize with your frustration at not being gainfully employed, but it simply does not excuse your mistreatment of those around you. Indeed, you almost reduced Mrs Hudson to tears the other morning, simply for her insisting you eat your breakfast! Judging by your pale, gaunt features, it was advice with which I heartily concur.’

  I was glaring angrily at my friend in anticipation of an aggressive response, but there was none. It was almost as if the fight, even the very life in him, was being slowly drained away. Attired in his purple robe, Holmes was seated in his favourite chair, legs crossed with his feet tucked under him, in a forlorn, meditative pose. His face, unshaven for three days, was impassive, and he merely nodded slowly without raising his eyes to look at me.

  I was unable to contemplate my friend in such condition for another instant and decided to take myself for a refreshing walk. Despite my entreaties, Holmes would not be moved so I struck out, briskly, alone.

  The climate and the time of year seemed to fit the prevailing mood perfectly. It was as dark and misty an evening as one would expect for late October, and the few remaining leaves were losing their battle to remain attached to the trees with which Baker Street was adorned. Thankfully, for the purposes of my constitutional, it was dry and relatively mild and each step that I took hardened my resolve to help Holmes in any way that I might.

  I paused briefly outside Baker Street Metropolitan station, to see if any of the late editions held anything to assist me in my purpose, and there on the headline board were four words that I was certain would rekindle Holmes’s interest and might just save him from his despair.

  MONTAGUE PHILLIMORE

  FOUND

  HANGED

  Without waiting for my change, I snatched an edition from the startled vendor, and sprinted back to 221b, only narrowly avoiding collisions with the homeward-bound travellers.

  To my consternation neither the clattering sound of my racing feet upon the stairs, nor the sight of this dramatic headline succeeded in stirring Holmes from his malaise. Crestfallen, but not defeated, I lit my pipe, sat by the fire and was determined to find something in the report that might have the desired effect.

  My regular readers may recall a passing reference to several of our less successful cases during the narrative of The Problem of Thor Bridge. By less successful I mean, of course, mysteries for which no obvious solution presented itself at the time and despite all our efforts, and the exercise of all of Holmes’s powers, seemed never likely to. However, I have safely retained the notes for all of these cases, and together with those of completed cases, which I do not consider worthy of publication, they now reside within a tin dispatch box of mine, buried within the vaults of Cox & Co’s bank. The case of James Phillimore and his bizarre disappearance had been one of our failures.

  I resolved there and then to be at the doors of Cox & Co. as they opened the following morning, and to confront Holmes with my old notes, together with any further information with which the morning papers might have provided us.

  I was somewhat delayed in the morning by Cox’s chaotic storage system and the vast number of notes in my chest that I had to sift through. I was astonished, therefore, to discover that Holmes was still to leave his bed when I arrived at Baker Street at a little after midday! At once I barged my way into his room, and pulled back his curtains. The room was flooded with bright daylight which highlighted the grey pallor of my ailing friend’s sunken face.

  ‘Holmes!’ I called, ‘I insist you rise at once and then join me for lunch. I shall simply not allow you to just fade away.’

  Holmes slowly raised himself on his elbows and began rubbing his bloodshot eyes.

  ‘So you are going to save me from myself, once again, eh Watson?’ He asked wearily.

  ‘That is certainly my intention,’ I replied. ‘I was hoping that the opportunity of closing one of your old files would be of sufficient interest to rouse you from your melancholy. This morning’s papers and my own resurrected notes certainly seem to make that a possibility.’

  ‘May I see those now, please?’ Holmes asked somewhat sheepishly.

  ‘Not until you have taken some lunch,’ I insisted with mock indignation.

  ‘I fancy a shave would also not go amiss.’ He smiled, the first I had seen on his face in a long time.

  He emerged from his room, clean-shaven and suited, just as Mrs Hudson arrived with our lunch tray.

  ‘So, Lazarus has risen at last,’ she remarked.

  ‘No less than I deserve, Mrs Hudson, I owe you a thousand apologies for my recent boorish behaviour. Now what lurks enticingly beneath those lids? I am absolutely ravenous!’ Holmes rubbed his hands together excitedly.

  Holmes devoured his rack of lamb with great gusto; not until the last morsel had been consumed and Mrs Hudson had removed the tray did we settle into our chairs with our cognacs and cigars, to discuss the disappearance of James Phillimore.

  I passed the newspapers to Holmes, but he declined these, though in a less dramatic manner than had been his custom of late.

  ‘No, no, Watson, I would much rather reacquaint myself with the case through your old notes than digest any new information the papers might contain.’

  Therefore, I began to read from my notes instead.

  ‘There was a particularly stormy October morning when the equinoctial elements seemed to be throwing down the gauntlet against our civilized world of brick, though thankfully in vain, that will long live in my memory. The branches of the leafless trees were being bent backwards and forwards into unnatural contortions and the few brave passers-by were engaged in a constant battle to keep their coat collars up and their umbrellas pointed in the right direction.’

  I paused when I observed Holmes showing signs of impatience and agitation. He was crossing, and recrossing his legs whilst drawing on his cigar as if it was a cigarette. Then he held up his hand as a gesture of remonstrance.

  ‘Watson, Watson! I beseech you to edit your narrative,’ he exclaimed.

  ‘I do not understand,’ I replied. ‘I have barely begun to read.’

  ‘Whilst I appreciate your undoubted skill with words, I am not one of your beguiled readers hanging on every one of them. To me your fine prose acts as nothing more than hindrance and obfuscation. They hinder the skilled detective from obtaining the relevant facts that will, eventually, lead us to a solution. Though they present a fine piece of romantic adventure to the untrained reader, to me they obstruct what would otherwise be an exercise in the pure, logical science of criminology.’

  Not for the first time during our long association Holmes seemed to take some misplaced pleasure in heaping scorn on to my humble, though rather elegant literary accomplishments.

  ‘I am sure that I have always given due regard to your deductive and scientific a
chievements throughout each narrative of our adventures, while at the same time making each tale more palatable to the wider public by employing the crafts and skills of a romantic author. I do not consider that your criticism is worthy and I am sure that your reputation has been greatly enhanced as a result of my work,’ was my indignant response.

  ‘Of what use is any reputation that I may have acquired if the merits of logical thought and analysis are buried beneath an avalanche of meaningless verbosity? However, I do not mean to detract from your skills with a pen and perhaps some of your less flowery chronicles may have had a beneficial effect on criminal detection on a broader base. Now pray continue, but please employ economy in your narration!’ Holmes implored as a conclusion to his lamentable attempt of an apology.

  Still feeling somewhat aggrieved, I sipped my cognac and continued reading, though now more hesitantly as I conscientiously edited the less relevant details.

  ‘As you will undoubtedly recall, the most singular case of James Phillimore’s disappearance was first brought to our attention by his brother, Montague, whose lamentable demise was reported in yesterday’s newspapers. Mrs Hudson was visiting her sister at the time, therefore Billy brought up his card and subsequently presented him to us, just after breakfast on a particularly wet morning.’ I should point out that Billy was the butcher’s son and a most presentable young lad who took over some of Mrs Hudson’s duties during her infrequent absences.

  ‘Montague Phillimore had been well prepared for the inclement weather and it took us several minutes to disentangle him from his sodden outer garments before handing these to Billy so that they might dry off by the parlour fire downstairs. Phillimore had been most grateful for the tea that Billy poured for him and sank down wearily into our visitor’s chair by the fire.