The Redacted Sherlock Holmes - Volume 3 by Orlando Pearson

Author:Orlando Pearson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Sherlock Holmes, mystery, crime, british crime, sherlock holmes fiction, sherlock holmes novels, sherlock holmes short fiction
ISBN: 9781787050167
Publisher: Andrews UK Limited 2016
Published: 2016-08-30T00:00:00+00:00

A Dutch Sandwich

One day in late 1907, just after my second wedding, my wife and I were sitting over breakfast when the maid came in with what she described as an urgent message. I had gone back into practice at our newly established home in Queen Square and picked up the envelope with some anxiety as only a serious medical case would normally bring a note meriting such a description. It was with a mixture of relief and joy that I recognised Holmes’s characteristic small neat lettering on the envelope. The message inside was terse:

“Must see you about softwear case. Come to Baker Street for quarter to ten this morning.”

“What is ‘softwear’?” I asked my new wife when the maid had left the room.

“Really, John,” she replied with a shy smile and perhaps the merest hint of a blush. “You appear to see but not to observe.” She paused to take a sip of tea.

My new wife had a wonderful skill in taking me back to my prime years in Baker Street and, as she paused for breath, I wondered where her explanation of what softwear is would take us.

“If you still don’t know what softwear is, we will, dear John,” she continued serenely, “have to undertake some more clothes shopping together.” As well as being adept in selecting a clever turn of phrase, my wife was a devotee of London’s choicest fashion outlets and this was not the first time she had used an apparently unrelated topic as a segue into a suggestion of a further purchase of items of clothing. “For us ladies,” she murmured with eye-lashes fluttering alluringly, “softwear is the very latest thing. The current trend in ladies’ clothing is for dress that is figure hugging and so it often contains embedded within the cloth so-called stiffeners such as whalebone or thin pieces of cane to hold it in place next to the body. Softwear is a brand of clothing manufactured by the London Softwear Company. The products are imported from the Low Countries and are subject to a special finishing process in London which is, I understand, of Dutch origin.”

“Do you know anything about this special process?” I asked, my curiosity piqued.

“I do not. The process is described in the Company’s advertising material as being special and secret. The outcome of it is, however, that their outfits are of the most stylish appearance with the same fine cut offered by other clothing designers, but they offer the wearer considerably enhanced levels of personal comfort. Accordingly, the clothes command a significant premium to those of London Softwear’s competitors. You have often been with me when we have bought Softwear products, but the details of our purchase have obviously escaped you. It is clear we must plan another shopping expedition at the earliest moment to give you a full opportunity to see and observe my buying habits.”

My bank balance was still at a parlous level as a result of the triple set of costs arising from our

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