by David Marcum
“Nor the Italians?” Marconi grimaced. “England is my home, my adopted country. I would do nothing to harm it. Such a thing would have put my research back for months. I have a great deal to thank you for.”
“Indeed you do. Now, I think it is time for me to return to my bees. They do not thrive well in the care of others. Gentlemen?” He rose quickly. “Come, Watson. We have a train to catch.”
Mr. Holmes and Dr. Watson Learn to Fly
by C. Edward Davis
It was only five years after the end of The War to End All Wars that I found myself strolling among the parked aeroplanes at the Schneider Trophy Race at Cowes on a lovely September afternoon. On my arm was my lovely companion, Elizabeth. She was resplendent that day, with a lively new bonnet with violet satin ribbons and her favorite dress.
Lizzie was chattering away in her exquisitely charming manner, commenting on the recent loss of the British national team to David Rittenhouse, the American, in his Curtiss CR-3. (I had been inordinately concerned about this particular race, as Holmes and I had laid a substantial wager the previous day. Now, I owed him ten pounds!). The beautiful September weather, the colorful attire of the other ladies, and the marvel of the flying machines were on display. Lizzie was one who, unlike many of her gender then, expressed an honest and deep fascination and appreciation for all things mechanical. She relished driving my 1921 Vauxhall 30-98 Velox about the countryside, scaring the livestock, and giving me more gray hairs than I deserve. She even owned a motorcycle, of which she believed that I was blissfully unaware. I did not have the heart to tell her I knew about it. I must confess that Lizzie was much more adventurous than this old warhorse.
I had paused at a booth advertising flying lessons and began woolgathering. Therefore, I did not hear Lizzie’s question to me. Her elbow nudged none too gently into my ribs, jarring me back to the present.
“Have you been listening to me, John Watson?” she chided. “You seem to be a thousand miles away. Are you alright?” Her liquid brown eyes stared into mine. I sheepishly smiled. “I’m sorry, my dear. I was reminiscing. What were you saying?”
She gave me that resigned glance all innamorati know so well, squinting up her left eye in that adorable manner of hers. “I was saying, John, wouldn’t it be delightful if we both learned to fly? It would be ever so wonderful, soaring up there with the birds, just flitting about among the angels. It seems to be quite affordable, don’t you think? What a thrill to learn to fly together! So romantic! What do you say, John, let’s?”
I chuckled, “You may take lessons, Lizzie, if that would make you happy. As for me, I really have no desire to repeat the adventure.”
Lizzie looked surprised. “What?” she stammered. “What do you mean ‘repeat the adventure’? Are you telling me, Doctor John Watson, that you already know how to fly, and that you have kept this a secret?”
Memories flooded my mind and I laughed. “Indeed, Lizzie, I do know how to fly. But it was years ago and I haven’t flown in a while, not since the War.” I took her hand and mustered every ounce of contriteness I had in my body. “I did not mean to keep it a secret from you. It is just that I had put that matter in my past and felt that it was something best left unsaid. In fact, though I did quite enjoy the experience, I always suffered from such headaches afterwards that I consider myself physically unsuitable for aerial existence.”
As we walked away from the booths, Lizzie peppered me with questions until I relented to tell her the entire story. I lead her to a confection tent, where I secured a small table far from the other patrons, and could talk uninterrupted. We ordered tea and I removed my hat and leaned forward.
Before I could start my tale, Lizzie whispered excitedly, “John, tell me all about this. I’m sure that it has something to do with that bee-keeper.”
I sipped my Earl Grey and nodded. “In fact,” said I, “it is a rather amusing story. One in which I bested the great detective most soundly.” Thus, I began my tale.
It was the twenty-second of July, 1910, a rather hot and humid day. My wife at that time was on an extended visit with her family. Holmes and I were on the train back to his villa near Eastbourne on the Sussex Downs after an enjoyable morning at Brooklands, where we watched the proceedings of the Royal Aeronautical Society’s aerial exhibition. Holmes had been quite taken by the whole affair and had obtained several publications about the air race, while I purchased a number of aeronautical magazines to entertain myself on the way back. Holmes chattered the whole way on the train and in the cab about what he had witnessed this day. Quite unlike him, actually. He was behaving much like an enthusiastic little boy. On he went, effusing about the marvels of aeronautical achievements only a couple of years after the American Wright brothers demonstrated their flying machine in Europe. “Just six short years, Watson. Imagine that! Six years since the aeroplane was invented, and here we are racing them! Astounding!”
I could only mumble my agreement, as I had become engrossed in an article describing the trials and tribulations of that little Brazilian, Santos-Dumont. I must have been quite obvious in ignoring Holmes, for he soon fell into one of his silent funks and stared out the compartment window. I still have an impression of his aquiline profile, looking out, shadows of trees and telegraph poles strobing across his face, and a cigarette dangling almost forgotten from his lips.
We rode in silence, save for the clatter of the train and the gentle rustle of the pages as I perused my magazine, when he suddenly announced, “I think that I shall learn to fly, Watson. One never knows when such a skill will come in handy in our endeavors. What do you think? It appears quite an easy undertaking, I would imagine.”
I glanced at him over the edge of my magazine, slightly perplexed at his sudden enthusiasm for this new adventure. “I doubt that learning to fly is as easy as the aviators make it appear, Holmes.” I replied.
“Nonsense, Watson!” he said, turning to me and lighting another cigarette. The smoke billowed from his nostrils, like the flames of a dragon. “Once one fully understands the physics of flight and the mechanics of the aeroplane, it should be nothing more difficult than riding a horse.”
“But you hate horseback riding,” I chuckled.
“That is beside the point,” Holmes replied testily. “With proper preparation and study, a person of my intellect should be able to fly with a minimum of instruction.” Suddenly, a mischievous glint came into my friend’s eye as he tossed his cigarette through the open compartment window with a deft flick of his fingers. He leaned forward, rested his elbows upon his knees, and steepled his long fingers against his lips. I had seen that look and that posture so many times before.
“I propose a wager, Watson,” he continued after a pause. “I will assert that I can learn to pilot a flying machine in record time.” He slapped my knee playfully. “In fact, I challenge you to learn to fly with me! Whoever learns to ‘go solo’, I believe is the terminology, will be declared the victor and the better aviator. What say you, Watson? Do you accept my challenge?”
I was taken aback. Absolutely stunned, actually. I stammered “What? Me, fly? No, Holmes, I couldn’t. I wouldn’t...”
“It is a challenge, my friend. Are you not man enough to accept?” He smiled as he leaned back in his seat.
“But, Holmes! I am an old man! Flying is a young man’s game!” I cried.
“Nonsense, Watson. Age is merely an illusion of the mind. I, for one, do not feel old.”
I rubbed my chin, thinking furiously. In absolute honesty, the prospect of flying alarmed me. Nevertheless, he had offered a dare, even challenged my masculinity. Moreover, I was rarely one to back away from a provocation. “And what shall be the stakes?” I asked, hoping that my friend would laugh and admit it was all a jest.
“It is my challenge. Therefore, you may decide the prize.”
I now considered several options and realized t
hat this was indeed a wager worthy of participation. However, I wished to make the stakes high enough that Holmes would refrain from pursuing this nonsense. I needed a deterrent, a prize so costly that he would have to refuse. Consequences so drastic, so unpalatable to him that he would reconsider and withdraw his frightening challenge. Then, inspiration struck me! I hit upon a prize so delicious to me, yet one I was sure Holmes could not accept.
“Very well, Holmes. Should I win then you shall treat me to a lavish dinner at an establishment that I shall choose later, with the guests of my choosing.”
“Agreed,” said Holmes with a smirk.
“I am not done, sir. The guests I choose may be rather disturbing to you. People with whom you may not wish to be seen in public. Are you still game?”
“Certainly. I doubt you would know such unsavory characters. Whom do you wish to invite? The spirit of Moriarty, perhaps. Or Moran? Certainly not Lestrade,” he said with a chortle. “Perhaps some American gangsters?”
Now it was my turn to laugh. “Your brothers, Mycroft and Sherrinford!”
Holmes bolted upright in his seat. The effect was as though I had suddenly struck him across the face with my walking stick. For the first time in all the years I had known this extraordinary man, he looked quite taken aback. I had met Mycroft on numerous occasions and, while the two brothers worked well together, I had the distinct impression of a peculiar tension between them. Of the other brother, Sherrinford, I knew little, except that he was quite a few years older than Holmes, and that my friend mentioned him rarely.
“How about fifty pounds,” he countered.
Suddenly I realized the enormous import of my suggestion. I had gained the upper hand on the great Sherlock Holmes! Struggling to keep a straight face, I replied firmly, “A Holmes Family dinner.”
“Pounds sterling.”
“Dinner.”
“One hundred pounds!”
I shook my head, “Your challenge, my prize. You said so yourself. Dinner with your reclusive brothers.”
“And should I be declared the winner, Watson? What are you willing to part with?”
“Two hundred pounds, cash.”
Holmes contemplated my counter-offer with narrowed eyes and his customary steepled fingers. I feared that I may have pushed the matter too far and began reconsidering changing my part of the wager. Just as I was about to make a new offer, Holmes spoke. “Make that three hundred pounds if you lose and it is done.”
Our train was arriving at our station just then, and I decided that if I insisted on such a trying prize for him, he would suggest cancelling the wager. Our train pulled into London, where we needed to change to the next train to Eastbourne. As it clattered to a halt with a squealing of brakes and the hiss of steam, Holmes mumbled, “Agreed. It shall be the easiest three hundred pounds I have ever earned.” I thought I detected an odd glint in Holmes’s eyes when we shook hands. With that, he threw open the compartment door and bolted from the train. He disappeared into the throngs of travelers. I waited for nearly half-an-hour before I was obliged to board the late train to Sussex alone. I was quite put out by Holmes’s abandonment, but I had become used to his unusual behavior over the years. Still, I worried about what my friend might be up to.
When I arrived alone at his villa, Holmes was nowhere to be found. I inquired of Mrs. Hudson if Holmes had come home, but she answered in the negative. She added that she had made a light supper for us and that she was quite put out over our late arrival. I waited another hour for Holmes to arrive, in vain. I was not overly worried for my friend, as it is in his manner to vanish unexpectedly, and so I attacked the roasted beef and salad Mrs. Hudson had prepared, and then retired to my bedroom.
Around nine o’clock, I was dozing in my chair, my feet up on a footstool, when I heard a motor cab. A door slammed and then Holmes’s heavy tread in the hall. I heard his bedroom door. Then I climbed into my own bed and fell asleep.
It was well before dawn, judging by the darkness outside my open window, when I was awakened by the sound of mumbling and the shuffling of feet. I tiptoed to my door and cracked it open. Peeking out, I perceived a shadowy figure moving back and forth by the light of a single lamp. It was Holmes, dressed in pajamas and a dressing gown, smoking his pipe and studying a thin book. His tobacco wafted behind his pacing form like the smoke from a speeding train.
I shrugged my shoulders, deciding not to disturb him, and went back to bed. However, his mumbling prevented me from more than dozing. Presently, there was a pounding at my door that startled me awake. Sunlight was stabbing through my window.
“Watson!” bellowed Holmes. “Wake up, man. We must be off to Hendon and arrange for our lessons. I intend not to waste a single moment. I shall be soaring like an eagle by the end of the week! Come on, old man! Get a move on!”
“Soaring like an eagle,” I mumbled. “Prancing like a peacock is more like it.”
I dressed quickly and had barely had enough time to swallow a cup of strong coffee before Holmes rushed us out of the house. Mrs. Hudson, bless her Scots soul, handed me a slice of dry toast as we ran out and into a waiting motor cab. Almost immediately, Holmes buried that prominent nose of his into his book and said not a word on the way to the station. I noticed the title: The Fundamentals of Flight by E. D. Carpenter.
The entire train ride to Hendon was accomplished in silence and Holmes would only communicate with me through grunts and snorts. Not for a second did he remove his eyes from that book. At the Colindale Station, I flagged a cab and we proceeded, again in silence, to Hendon Aerodrome. At the entrance, Holmes slapped his book shut, ordering, “Follow me, Watson,” and we marched towards the nearest hangar. Holmes stopped a rumpled-looking man in oil-stained, greasy overalls carrying a foul-smelling bucket of God-knows-what and asked for the location of the Carpenter Flying Academy. The man nodded over his shoulder. “O’er there, mate. Just the far side of the Graham-White hangar. American blokes, sellin’ those damned Wright crates. Can’t miss it. Look for big red letters.” With that, the man stalked off towards what, judging by the pungent odor, was a sewage pond. When I looked back at Holmes, he was steadily making his way to the hangars. I trotted to catch up.
We strolled across the rutted grass field and I became engrossed watching several aeroplanes rise from the center of the field, while others landed just behind them. To me, it all seemed such chaos and confusion. My apprehension grew and I was tempted to release Holmes from our wager, but he was many steps ahead of me. As we passed the front of the Graham-White hangar, two rather frail-looking craft roared off in a blatting of engines and great bluish-gray clouds of noxious smoke. One of these wafted over us and I caught a peculiar, yet familiar, aroma. “Castor oil, Watson. They mix it with the petrol to lubricate the engines. Don’t breathe too deeply, if you take my meaning.”
I watched the two machines, which seemed more air than solid, as they trundled across the dew-soaked grass, turning one way, then the other, with men trotting alongside guiding the wings and wrestling them into their turns. Not once did they make any effort to leave the ground. I turned to Holmes to remark on this observation, but he was already approaching our objective. I hurried after him.
Large red letters, edged with black, arced over the open doors of the hangar, proclaiming “Carpenter Aviation Academy and Sales”. Below, in smaller black letters, “Authorized British Wright Aeroplane Dealer: Sales, Rentals, Instructions”. Within the hangar stood three ungainly looking contraptions that, to my eye, appeared to be a hodge-podge of sticks, wires, and greasy linen. The cloying odor of petrol, castor oil, grease, soiled rags, and varnish was all but overwhelming. I stepped into the cavernous interior.
Behind the farthest machine, by the lower wing, I spied Holmes in earnest conversation with a well-built, handsome young man of about thirty years of age. He was dressed in a dirty pair of tan overalls, streaked with grease
and spotted with oil. His sleeves were rolled to just above his elbows, his arms and hands were filthy, and he was wiping them with a rag that looked to have more stains on it than his coveralls. His sandy hair was uncombed and windblown, and a pair of glass-lensed goggles hung from his neck. However, the most outstanding feature of this man was his startlingly piercing blue eyes, so intense and focused. Little lines radiated from the corners of those intense eyes, indicating a man who laughed often and found pleasure and humor in his entire day. His face, chiseled and young, was deeply tanned with rosy cheeks that I assumed were the result of hours spent above the clouds. This was Mr. E. D. Carpenter, flying instructor and salesman.
As I drew nearer, I heard Carpenter say, rather emphatically, “No, Mr. Plimpton. I will give you flying lessons only if you follow my curriculum and government recommendations. I strongly advise against any attempt at flying without proper instruction. Reading a book on the matter, even if it is my book, is inadequate to prepare you to receive your pilot’s certificate. This is nothing like riding a horse or bicycle.” Carpenter’s American accent was very strong, but I was unable to place it. (I later discovered that he was from Boston.)
Holmes turned in my direction, his face clouded with frustration. “It appears, Mr. Watson, that Mr. Carpenter refuses to permit me to take up one of his flying machines, even though I have memorized every page of his book.” He turned back to Carpenter. “Frankly, sir, I am a trifle insulted that you doubt my abilities. I should think that the publicity derived from a novice reading your book and then successfully operating a flying machine would not only increase sales, but initiate a stampede of people to your door in search of the flying machine that you represent.”
Carpenter turned, looking pleadingly at me. “If you are Mr. Plimpton’s friend, please convince him that it is not about sales or publicity. Proper instruction will assure his own safety during his lessons and future aviating endeavors, if any. I cannot in good conscience issue a pilot’s certificate to just anybody who comes through those doors. There ain’t an instructor in England, in the entire world, who’ll simply let you take one of their machines and teach yourself. Expecting to learn all one requires to fly by simply reading a book is lunacy!”
