His Last Bow: Some Reminiscences of Sherlock Holmes is a collection of previously published Sherlock Holmes stories by Arthur Conan Doyle, including the titular short story, "His Last Bow. The War Service of Sherlock Holmes" (1917). The collection's first US edition adjusts the anthology's subtitle to Some Later Reminiscences of Sherlock Holmes. All editions contain a brief preface, by "John H. Watson, M.D.", that assures readers that as of the date of publication (1917), Holmes is long retired from his profession of detective but is still alive and well, albeit suffering from a touch of rheumatism.
Geoffrey Giuliano is the author of over thirty internationally bestselling biographies, including the London Sunday Times bestseller Blackbird: The Life and Times of Paul McCartney and Dark Horse: The Private Life of George Harrison. He can be heard on the Westwood One Radio Network and has written and produced over seven hundred original spoken-word albums and video documentaries on various aspects of popular culture. He is also a well known movie actor.
Release date:
August 4, 2011
Publisher:
Headline
Print pages:
247
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Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was born in Picardy Place in Edinburgh on May 22, 1859, son of Charles Altamount Doyle and Mary (Foley)
Doyle, and one of seven children who survived to adulthood. The Doyles were an artistic family, the most successful being
Arthur’s uncle ‘Dickie’ Doyle, the noted illustrator for Punch, but his father suffered from alcoholism and later epilepsy, and was eventually committed to a mental hospital. Conan Doyle
maintained a distant relationship with him, but it was his mother, whom he affectionately referred to as ‘the Ma’am’, who
encouraged his love of literature, and he remained close to her throughout his life. The young Arthur was educated at the
northern Jesuit school Stonyhurst, going on to study medicine at Edinburgh and was an enthusiastic reader and storyteller
from a young age, as well as being an active sportsman.
Conan Doyle incurred the wrath of his rich relations when he announced he was an agnostic. Rejecting their strict Catholicism
and cut off from their patronage, he decided to set up his own practice in Southsea in 1882. There he met his first wife,
Louise Hawkins or ‘Touie’, and the couple were married in 1885, later having two children, a son and daughter. But in 1897
Conan Doyle met and instantly fell in love with Jean Leckie. They maintained a platonic relationship for ten years and Conan
Doyle struggled with his feelings of guilt and deep affection for his wife and his passion for Jean. When in 1906 Touie died
of consumption, Conan Doyle genuinely mourned her. He finally married Jean in 1907 and they had two sons and a daughter, living
very happily together on their estate in Sussex, Windlesham, until Conan Doyle’s death in 1930.
It was in the year after his first marriage that Conan Doyle began toying with a character called Sherrinford Holmes. This
was to become the first Sherlock Holmes story, his ‘shilling shocker’, A Study in Scarlet, published in 1887. And so the celebrated detective was born, with the faithful Dr Watson at his side. Conan Doyle consistently
gave credit for the character to Dr Joseph Bell, an old tutor of his from Edinburgh University whose precision and powers
of deduction Conan Doyle greatly admired. On the origins of the name, he commented that ‘I made thirty runs [at cricket] against
a bowler by the name of Sherlock, and I always had a kindly feeling for the name’.
But it was in the new, popular literary magazine the Strand that the phenomenon of Sherlock Holmes really took off, with ‘A Scandal in Bohemia’ appearing in 1891. It was an instant
hit. Sidney Paget created the distinctive illustrations of Holmes, based on his younger brother Walter, depicted in a deerstalker
(the pipe would come later). This iconic image became etched in the public’s mind and was more glamorous than Conan Doyle
had envisaged; ‘the handsome Walter took the place of the more powerful, but uglier, Sherlock, and perhaps from the point
of view of my lady readers it was as well.’
By this time Conan Doyle had given up practising medicine entirely to write. He yearned to concentrate on his historical novels
and, despite his success, saw Holmes as ‘taking his mind from better things’. So, after only two years, in 1893 he decided
to kill him off in ‘The Final Problem’, where Holmes famously met his end alongside his nemesis Professor Moriarty. The public
outcry was instant: women wept, men donned black armbands and subscriptions to the Strand plummeted by over 20,000, yet Conan Doyle was unmoved: ‘I feel towards him as I do towards pâté de foie gras, of which I once ate too much, so that the name of it gives me a sickly feeling to this day.’ It wasn’t until 1901 that Holmes
reappeared in The Hound of the Baskervilles (a story that predated his death) and, with the public clamouring for more, Doyle finally brought him back to life in ‘The Adventure of the Empty House’ (1903). By the
beginning of the twentieth century the fan base for Sherlock Holmes was massive and far-reaching, from a Boston cabby in America
to Abdul Hamid II, the then Sultan of Turkey, and has continued growing to this day. There have been countless stage productions
and films, with Holmes defined by such actors as Basil Rathbone, Jeremy Brett and Michael Caine. And the stories weren’t merely
entertainment; the investigative methods Conan Doyle used are said to have had a huge influence on police processes at the
time.
Although Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s name will always be synonymous with Sherlock Holmes, his volume of works was huge and wide-ranging,
including historical fiction such as Micah Clarke and The White Company, histories of the Boer War and World War One, as well as the Professor Challenger stories, The Lost World (seen as the inspiration for Michael Crichton’s hugely popular Jurassic Park) and The Poison Belt. Conan Doyle’s fascination with spiritualism very much governed his outlook later on in life and he wrote The Coming of the Fairies in response to the case of the Cottingley fairies. Many fans found it hard to associate the creator of a detective so wedded
to cool logic and fact with this ardent champion of the supernatural, but he never swayed in his beliefs.
Conan Doyle died in 1930 at the age of seventy-one, with his beloved Jean by his side and was buried in the grounds of Windlesham,
with the headstone inscribed, at his request, ‘Steel True, Blade Straight’. Sir Winston Churchill said, ‘I had a great admiration
for him. Of course I read every Sherlock Holmes story … [they] have certainly found a permanent place in English literature.’
I. THE SINGULAR EXPERIENCE OFMR JOHN SCOTT ECCLES
I find it recorded in my notebook that it was a bleak and windy day towards the end of March in the year 1892. Holmes had received
a telegram whilst we sat at our lunch, and he had scribbled a reply. He made no remark, but the matter remained in his thoughts,
for he stood in front of the fire afterwards with a thoughtful face, smoking his pipe, and casting an occasional glance at
the message. Suddenly he turned upon me with a mischievous twinkle in his eyes.
‘I suppose, Watson, we must look upon you as a man of letters,’ said he. ‘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. If you cast
your mind back to some of those narratives with which you have afflicted a long-suffering public, you will recognise how often the grotesque has deepened into the criminal. Think of that little affair of the red-headed men.
That was grotesque enough in the outset, and yet it ended in a desperate attempt at robbery. Or, again, there was that most
grotesque affair of the five orange pips, which led straight to a murderous conspiracy. The word puts me on the alert.’
‘Have you it there?’ I asked.
He read the telegram aloud. ‘
“Have just had most incredible and grotesque experience. May I consult you? – Scott Eccles, Post Office, Charing Cross.”’
‘Man or woman?’ I asked.
‘Oh, man, of course. No woman would ever send a reply-paid telegram. She would have come.’
‘Will you see him?’
‘My dear Watson, you know how bored I have been since we locked up Colonel Carruthers. My mind is like a racing engine, tearing
itself to pieces because it is not connected up with the work for which it was built. Life is commonplace, the papers are
sterile; audacity and romance seem to have passed for ever from the criminal world. Can you ask me, then, whether I am ready
to look into any new problem, however trivial it may prove? But here, unless I am mistaken, is our client.’
A measured step was heard upon the stairs, and a moment later a stout, tall, grey-whiskered and solemnly respectable person
was ushered into the room. 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. But some amazing
experience had disturbed his native composure and left its traces in his bristling hair, his flushed, angry cheeks, and his
flurried, excited manner. He plunged instantly into his business.
‘I have had a most singular and unpleasant experience, Mr Holmes,’ said he. ‘Never in my life have I been placed in such a
situation. It is most improper – most outrageous. I must insist upon some explanation.’ He swelled and puffed in his anger.
‘Pray sit down, Mr Scott Eccles,’ said Holmes, in a soothing voice. ‘May I ask, in the first place, why you came to me at
all?’
‘Well, sir, it did not appear to be a matter which concerned the police, and yet, when you have heard the facts, you must
admit that I could not leave it where it was. Private detectives are a class with whom I have absolutely no sympathy, but
none the less, having heard your name—’
‘Quite so. But, in the second place, why did you not come at once?’
‘What do you mean?’
Holmes glanced at his watch.
‘It is a quarter past two,’ he said. ‘Your telegram was dispatched about one. But no one can glance at your toilet and attire
without seeing that your disturbance dates from the moment of your waking.’
Our client smoothed down his unbrushed hair and felt his unshaven chin.
‘You are right, Mr Holmes. I never gave a thought to my toilet. I was only too glad to get out of such a house. But I have
been running round making inquiries before I came to you. I went to the house agents, you know, and they said that Mr Garcia’s rent was paid up all right and that everything was in order at Wisteria Lodge.’
‘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. Please arrange your thoughts and let me know, in their due sequence, exactly what those events are which have
sent you out unbrushed and unkempt, with dress boots and waistcoat buttoned awry, in search of advice and assistance.’
Our client looked down with a rueful face at his own unconventional appearance.
‘I’m sure it must look very bad, Mr Holmes, and I am not aware that in my whole life such a thing has ever happened before.
But I will tell you the whole queer business, and when I have done so you will admit, I am sure, that there has been enough
to excuse me.’
But his narrative was nipped in the bud. There was a bustle outside, and Mrs Hudson opened the door to usher in two robust
and official-looking individuals, one of whom was well known to us as Inspector Gregson of Scotland Yard, an energetic, gallant,
and, within his limitations, a capable officer. He shook hands with Holmes, and introduced his comrade as Inspector Baynes
of the Surrey Constabulary.
‘We are hunting together, Mr Holmes, and our trail lay in this direction.’ He turned his bulldog eyes upon our visitor. ‘Are
you Mr John Scott Eccles, of Popham House, Lee?’
‘I am.’
‘We have been following you about all the morning.’
‘You traced him through the telegram, no doubt,’ said Holmes.
‘Exactly, Mr Holmes. We picked up the scent at Charing Cross Post Office and came on here.’
‘But why do you follow me? What do you want?’
‘We wish a statement, Mr Scott Eccles, as to the events which led up to the death last night of Mr Aloysius Garcia, of Wisteria
Lodge, near Esher.’
Our client had sat up with staring eyes and every tinge of colour struck from his astonished face.
‘Dead? Did you say he was dead?’
‘Yes, sir, he is dead.’
‘But how? An accident?’
‘Murder, if ever there was one upon earth.’
‘Good God! This is awful! You don’t mean – you don’t mean that I am suspected?’
‘A letter of yours was found in the dead man’s pocket, and we know by it that you had planned to pass last night at his house.’
‘So I did.’
‘Oh, you did, did you?’
Out came the official notebook.
‘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.’
Our visitor had gulped off the brandy and the colour had returned to his face. With a dubious glance at the inspector’s notebook, he plunged at once into his extraordinary statement.
‘I am a bachelor,’ said he, ‘and, being of a sociable turn, I cultivate a large number of friends. Among these are the family
of a retired brewer called Melville, living at Albemarle Mansion, Kensington. It was at his table that I met some weeks ago
a young fellow named Garcia. He was, I understood, of Spanish descent and connected in some way with the Embassy. He 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, Wisteria Lodge, between Esher and Oxshott. Yesterday evening I went to Esher to fulfil this
engagement.
‘He had described his household to me before I went there. He lived with a faithful servant, a countryman of his own, who
looked after all his needs. This fellow could speak English and did his housekeeping for him. Then there was a wonderful cook,
he said, a half-breed whom he had picked up in his travels, who could serve an excellent dinner. I remember that he remarked
what a queer household it was to find in the heart of Surrey, and that I agreed with him, though it has proved a good deal
queerer than I thought.
‘I drove to the place – about two miles on the south side of Esher. The house was a fair-sized one, standing back from the
road, with a curving drive which was banked with high evergreen shrubs. It was an old, tumbledown building in a crazy state of disrepair. When the trap pulled up on the
grass-grown drive in front of the blotched and weather-stained door, I had doubts as to my wisdom in visiting a man whom I
knew so slightly. He opened the door himself, however, and greeted me with a great show of cordiality. I was handed over to
the manservant, a melancholy, swarthy individual, who led the way, my bag in his hand, to my bedroom. The whole place was
depressing. Our dinner was tête à tête, and though my host did his best to be entertaining, his thoughts seemed to continually wander, and he talked so vaguely
and wildly that I could hardly understand him. He continually drummed his fingers on the table, gnawed his nails, and gave
other signs of nervous impatience. The dinner itself was neither well served nor well cooked, and the gloomy presence of the
taciturn servant did not help to enliven us. I can assure you that many times in the course of the evening I wished that I
could invent some excuse which would take me back to Lee.
‘One thing comes back to my memory which may have a bearing upon the business that you two gentlemen are investigating. I
thought nothing of it at the time. Near the end of dinner a note was handed in by the servant. I noticed that after my host
had read it he seemed even more distrait and strange than before. He gave up all pretence at conversation and sat, smoking
endless cigarettes, lost in his own thoughts, but he made no remark as to the contents. About eleven I was glad to go to bed.
Some time later Garcia looked in at my door – the room was dark at the time – and asked me if I had rung. I said that I had
not. He apologised for having disturbed me so late, saying that it was nearly one o’clock. I dropped off after this and slept soundly all night.
‘And now I come to the amazing part of my tale. When I woke it was broad daylight. I glanced at my watch, and the time was
nearly nine. I had particularly asked to be called at eight, so I was very much astonished at this forgetfulness. I sprang
up and rang for the servant. There was no response. I rang again and again, with the same result. Then I came to the conclusion
that the bell was out of order. I huddled on my clothes and hurried downstairs in an exceedingly bad temper to order some
hot water. You can imagine my surprise when I found that there was no one there. I shouted in the hall. There was no answer.
Then I ran from room to room. All were deserted. My host had shown me which was his bedroom the night before, so I knocked
at the door. No reply. I turned the handle and walked in. The room was empty, and the bed had never been slept in. He had
gone with the rest. The foreign host, the foreign footman, the foreign cook, all had vanished in the night! That was the end
of my visit to Wisteria Lodge.’
Sherlock Holmes was rubbing his hands and chuckling as he added this bizarre incident to his collection of strange episodes.
‘Your experience is, so far as I know, perfectly unique,’ said he. ‘May I ask, sir, what you did then?’
‘I was furious. My first idea was that I had been the victim of some absurd practical joke. I packed my things, banged the
hall door behind me, and set off for Esher, with my bag in my hand. I called at Allan Brothers’, the chief land agents in
the village, and found that it was from this firm that the villa had been rented. It struck me that the whole proceeding could
hardly be for the purpose of making a fool of me, and that the main object must be to get out of the rent. It is late in March, so quarter-day is at hand.
But this theory would not work. The agent was obliged to me for my warning, but told me that the rent had been paid in advance.
Then I made my way to town and called at the Spanish Embassy. The man was unknown there. After this I went to see Melville,
at whose house I had first met Garcia, but I found that he really knew rather less about him than I did. Finally, when I got
your reply to my wire I came out to you, since I understand that you are a person who gives advice in difficult cases. But
now, Mr Inspector, I gather, from what you said when you entered the room, that you can carry the story on, and that some
tragedy has occurred. I can assure you that every word I have said is the truth, and that, outside of what I have told you,
I know absolutely nothing about the fate of this man. My only desire is to help the law in every possible way.’
‘I am sure of it, Mr Scott Eccles – I am sure of it,’ said Inspector Gregson, in a very amiable tone. ‘I am bound to say that
everything which you have said agrees very closely with the facts as they have come to our notice. For examp. . .
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