The Mammoth Book of New Sherlock Holmes Adventures by Mike Ashley (Ed)

Author:Mike Ashley (Ed) [Ashley, Mike]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2011-07-04T07:00:00+00:00

The Adventure of the Touch of God - Peter Crowther

It was with a mixture of trepidation and eager anticipation that, on a cold and dank November evening, having just arrived back at our rooms in Baker Street from a day-long symposium on glandular deterioration, I greeted Sherlock Holmes's announcement that we were to journey to Harrogate.

Despite being some 200 or more miles from the capital's bustling familiarity and drudgery (two indistinguishable sides of the same tarnished coin), the trip clearly promised a return to matters of detection. For though Holmes complemented news of our impending departure with the promise of bracingYorkshire air to clean clogged and jaded tubes — of both a bronchial and a cerebral nature — I suspected an ulterior motive.

That is not to say that my good friend was not given to displays of impetuosity. Indeed, he had proven to me on many occasions that he was the very soul of immediacy. It was as though he were cognizant of his own mortality. Sometimes, I even thought that he was frightened of idleness, though he was not a man prone to fear or cowardice. Rather it was, or so it seemed, the prospect of inaction that presented the most serious affront to his sense of being. Action, or "the game" as he liked to regard the often heinous crimes whose unravelling he was frequently called upon to master, was what he was here to do. It was for this singular reason that I so welcomed the prospect.

For myself, however, the approach was entirely different. Somewhat in contradiction to the cautious and even begrudging excitement I have already mentioned, it was my custom to regard the prospect of further nefarious activities with some

apprehension. On the occasion in question, this feeling was particularly pronounced.

"Might I at least remove my topcoat?" I enquired.

"No time for that, old fellow," Holmes blustered. "We are to leave within the hour. Here." He held out to me a single sheet of paper and the envelope in which it had arrived.

Affixing my reading spectacles, I glanced at the letter and its careful and practised copperplate hand. "Read it aloud, old fellow," Holmes proclaimed with a pride that suggested he himself as the missive's author.

" 'My Dear Mr Sherlock Holmes,' it begins," I said. " 'Please forgive the brevity of this note and its undoubted intrusion on your privacy but I am in dire need of advice and assistance on a matter of grave importance.' "

" 'Grave importance', " Holmes said, turning his back to the fire crackling in the grate. "Capital!" He glanced across at me and waved a dismissive hand. "Do continue, Watson."

I returned my attention to the letter.

" 'A situation has arisen,' " I resumed, " 'here in Harrogate which, I feel, requires a level of experience and a depth of knowledge that I am in all honesty quite unqualified to provide, despite some thirty years with the Force.' "

"Force?" I enquired of Holmes. "The sender is a policeman?" "Read on, read on," Holmes instructed, and he walked to the window and stared into the street.

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