Mammoth Books presents The Case of the Sporting Squire

Book 433: Mammoth Books

by Guy N. Smith

Genres: Mystery

Synopsis

Violet Morgan is found dead in the library of Winchcombe Hall. She is found where she always used to read after dinner. Mortified, her daughter Gloria Morgan visits Sherlock Holmes. She accuses her father of murdering his wife so he is legally able to marry his mistress Eva Dann and acquire Longparish Estate, but the local doctor Lambeth is insistent her mother died of lockjaw. Holmes and Watson dash to Andover to untangle the disastrous events of the night before last.

Release date: May 17, 2012

Publisher: C & R Crime

Print pages: 17

Sample

It was during 1887 that Watson obtained permission from Holmes to seek formal publication for his account of their meeting and the case known as “A Study in Scarlet”. It’s quite likely he finalized this novel while on holiday in Scotland and submitted it to the publisher Ward Lock via his agent Arthur Conan Doyle. Ward Lock published it in their Beeton’s Christmas Annual that December and that was the first time that the general public came to learn of Sherlock Holmes. It inevitably led to an upsurge in the number of requests Holmes received and also, Holmes jokingly acknowledged, caused him to start going about his business in disguise. More importantly, it meant that Watson began to keep a better record of the cases. Flushed by the success of this sale Watson now wrote up most of the cases that happened over the following year from the end of 1887 and through 1888. These include some of Holmes’s best: “Silver Blaze”, with the curious incident of the dog in the night; “The Valley of Fear”; “The Greek Interpreter” – which is remarkable in that not until now did Watson apparently discover that Holmes had a brother, Mycroft, though we know he was aware of him earlier; and “The Cardboard Box”, in which Holmes reveals his ability to deduce Watson’s thoughts. Another of the cases falling in this period was that of “The Sporting Squire”, one that Watson did not refer to but which came to light following the investigations of that redoubtable author Guy N. Smith early in his own career when undertaking research into the theory and practice of gamekeeping.

I have long learned to tolerate the varying moods of my colleague, Sherlock Holmes. When a working fit was upon him, nothing could exceed his energy; at other times he would lie on the sofa, scarcely moving from morning to night, his eyes closed but. . .