The Big Book of Sherlock Holmes Stories

by Otto Penzler

  Five days after the Arcturus sailed, on September 14, I was forced to declare President William McKinley dead. He had been said to be recovering, but a few days later he succumbed to blood poisoning. There was some speculation, especially in the papers in New York City and Washington, that Dr. Mann had botched the surgery. There was even some lamentation that on the grounds of the Exposition had been an experimental X-ray machine, which could easily have found even fragments of a bullet. That was precisely why I, or Dr. Mann, had forbidden its use.

  Nine days later, on the testimony of eyewitnesses, Leon Czolgosz, the young man who had shot the president, was convicted of murder. He was taken from the court to Auburn Penitentiary, where he was executed in an electric chair, another application of the marvels of electricity celebrated by the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo. The one flaw of the modern method in comparison to hanging was that when a single wire was loosened, an electric chair became simply a chair. A fine actor can perform a set of death throes that would make a gravedigger faint.

  Holmes and Dr. Mann were among the dignitaries who attended the very small funeral held at the penitentiary for the murderer. The casket had been nailed shut because the face of the killer Czolgosz had been disfigured by sulfuric acid poured on the corpse by persons unknown. Presiding over the funeral was a young clergyman who gave an extremely impressive elegy, inspiring all listeners with the notion that even the worst sinner can be forgiven and admitted to the kingdom of heaven. Afterward we took him to the nearest railway station and bought him a ticket, not to heaven, but only to New York, where he was in time to begin rehearsals for a Broadway play called Life, which opened the following March to appreciative notices.

  After the state funeral of the president in Washington, it was popularly supposed that Mrs. Ida McKinley returned to Ohio where she was to live with her sister. I often thought of her during the next seven years, knowing that she was living happily by turns as the wife of Selim Bey or of the Reverend Dr. McEachern—a veiled Moslem to the Christians, and a Christian to the Moslems, a person who pretended never to speak the language of those around her, and never had to explain herself. When she died after seven years, her body was secretly shipped back to Ohio and then buried by her sister, as though she had lived as a reclusive widow all along.

  On the fourteenth of September, 1901, when it was first announced that President McKinley was dying, a number of notables rushed to Buffalo. One of them was his old friend Senator Mark Hanna, and another was the young vice president, Theodore Roosevelt. He stayed at the Ansley Wilcox mansion at 641 Delaware Avenue, where he was sworn in late that night as the twenty-sixth president of the United States. Whether in later years Roosevelt lived up to his predecessor’s hopes, I cannot say. As Selim Bey or Dr. McEachern, the former president declared himself to be happy in retirement and never gave another political opinion. But the Great War he had feared did not begin until 1914, did not involve America until 1917, and ended a year later as he had hoped it would, with his country victorious and growing stronger.

  —

  Curator’s Note: Although Dr. Watson’s claims cannot be verified, the circumstances of the manuscript’s discovery in a locked metal box hidden in his great-grandson’s home in London with several other, equally startling manuscripts might add credibility for some readers. Many personalities in Dr. Watson’s story were real people, e.g. Mark Hanna, Ida and William McKinley, Dr. Roswell Park, Mr. John Milburn, George Cortelyou, Chief William Bull, “Dr. Mann,” Leon Czolgosz, Theodore Roosevelt, Ansley Wilcox, and Sherlock Holmes. Watson’s description of the assassination appears to agree with descriptions by eyewitnesses, even in the particular of the distraction of the guards by the unidentified Italian. Czolgosz’s body actually was rendered unrecognizable because of sulfuric acid poured on it by persons unknown after his execution. The actor Sydney Barton Booth really was a descendant of Edwin Booth, a pro-Lincoln member of the acting family, and he had a fine career that lasted long enough for him to appear in several successful motion pictures. As for timing, we do know that the whereabouts of Holmes and Watson are unknown between Thursday, May 16, 1901, when the “Priory School” events took place, and Tuesday, November 19, 1901, when they were seen during the “Sussex Vampire” case.

  The Case of Colonel Warburton’s Madness

  LYNDSAY FAYE

  AFTER TEN YEARS as a professional actress on the West Coast, Lyndsay Faye (1980– ) moved to New York in 2005 to further her career but quickly found the competition and lifestyle daunting so turned to writing.

  A lifelong aficionado of Sherlock Holmes, Faye pitted Holmes against Jack the Ripper in her first book, Dust and Shadow: An Account of the Ripper Killings by Dr. John H. Watson (2000). It was given blessings by the Arthur Conan Doyle Estate and received praise from many sources, including Caleb Carr, who wrote his own pastiche, The Italian Secretary, in 2005.

  Faye followed Dust and Shadow with The Gods of Gotham (2012), an ambitious first novel in a series about Timothy Wilde, a bartender who becomes a policeman at the time that New York was creating its police department in 1846, coincidentally the year of the great Irish potato famine; it was nominated for an Edgar Award. Her massive historical research was put to use again for the second Wilde novel, Seven for a Secret (2013), which deals with “blackbirders,” underworld thugs who kidnap northern Negroes and sell them into slavery in the South.

  “The Case of Colonel Warburton’s Madness” was selected for the prestigious The Best American Mystery Stories 2010, edited by Lee Child; it is one of ten stories Faye has written about Holmes, the most recent and longest being “The Gospel of Sheba” (2014). “The Case of Colonel Warburton’s Madness” was first published in Sherlock Holmes in America, edited by Martin H. Greenberg, Jon L. Lellenberg, and Daniel Stashower (New York, Skyhorse, 2009).

  THE CASE OF COLONEL WARBURTON’S MADNESS

  Lyndsay Faye

  MY FRIEND Mr. Sherlock Holmes, while possessed of one of the most vigorous minds of our generation, and while capable of displaying tremendous feats of physical activity when the situation required it, could nevertheless remain in his armchair perfectly motionless longer than any human being I have ever encountered. This skill passed wholly unrecognized by its owner. I do not believe he held any intentions to impress me so, nor do I think the exercise was, for him, a strenuous one. Still I maintain the belief that when a man has held the same pose for a period exceeding three hours, and when that man is undoubtedly awake, that same man has accomplished an unnatural feat.

  I turned away from my task of organizing a set of old journals that lead-gray afternoon to observe Holmes perched with one leg curled beneath him, firelight burnishing the edges of his dressing gown as he sat with his head in his hand, a long-abandoned book upon the carpet. The familiar sight had grown increasingly unnerving as the hours progressed. It was with a view to ascertain that my friend was still alive that I went so far against my habits as to interrupt his reverie.

  “My dear chap, would you care to take a turn with me? I’ve an errand with the bootmaker down the road, and the weather has cleared somewhat.”

  I do not know if it was the still-ominous dark canopy that deterred him or his own pensive mood, but Holmes merely replied, “I require better distraction just now than an errand which is not my own and the capricious designs of a March rainstorm.”

  “What precise variety of distraction would be more to your liking?” I inquired, a trifle nettled at his dismissal.

  He waved a slender hand, at last lifting his dark head from the upholstery where it had reclined for so long. “Nothing you can provide me. It is the old story—for these two days I have received not a shred of worthwhile correspondence, nor has any poor soul abused our front doorbell with an eye to engage my services. The world is weary, I am weary, and I grow weary with being weary of it. Thus, Watson, as you see I am entirely useless myself at the moment, my state cannot be bettered through frivolous occupations.”

  “I suppose I wou
ld be pleased no one is so disturbed in mind as to seek your aid, if I did not know what your work meant to you,” I said with greater sympathy.

  “Well, well, there is no use lamenting over it.”

  “No, but I should certainly help if I could.”

  “What could you possibly do?” he sniffed. “I hope you are not about to tell me your pocket watch has been stolen, or your great-aunt disappeared without trace.”

  “I am safe on those counts, thank you. But perhaps I can yet offer you a problem to vex your brain for half an hour.”

  “A problem? Oh, I’m terribly sorry—I had forgotten. If you want to know where the other key to the desk has wandered off to, I was given cause recently to test the pliancy of such objects. I’ll have a new one made—”

  “I had not noticed the key,” I interrupted him with a smile, “but I could, if you like, relate a series of events which once befell me when I was in practice in San Francisco, the curious details of which have perplexed me for years. My work on these old diaries reminded me of them yet again, and the circumstances were quite in your line.”

  “I suppose I should be grateful you are at least not staring daggers at my undocketed case files,” he remarked.

  “You see? There are myriad advantages. It would be preferable to venturing out, for it is already raining again. And should you refuse, I will be every bit as unoccupied as you, which I would also prefer to avoid.” I did not mention that if he remained a statue an instant longer, the sheer eeriness of the room would force me out of doors.

  “You are to tell me a tale of your frontier days, and I am to solve it?” he asked blandly, but the subtle angle of one eyebrow told me he was intrigued.

  “Yes, if you can.”

  “What if you haven’t the data?”

  “Then we shall proceed directly to the brandy and cigars.”

  “It’s a formidable challenge.” To my great relief, he lifted himself in the air by his hands and crossed his legs underneath him, reaching when he had done so for the pipe lying cold on the side table. “I cannot say I’ve any confidence it can be done, but as an experiment, it has a certain flair.”

  “In that case, I shall tell you the story, and you may pose any questions that occur to you.”

  “From the beginning, mind, Watson,” he admonished, settling himself into a comfortable air of resigned attention. “And with as many details as you can summon up.”

  “It is quite fresh in my mind again, for I’d set it down in the volumes I was just mulling over. As you know, my residence in America was relatively brief, but San Francisco lives in my memory quite as vividly as Sydney or Bombay—an impetuous, thriving little city nestled among the great hills, where the fogs are spun from ocean air and the sunlight refracts from Montgomery Street’s countless glass windows. It is as if all the men and women of enterprise across the globe determined they should have a city of their own, for the Gold Rush built it and the Silver Lode built it again, and now that they have been linked by railroad with the eastern states, the populace believes nothing is impossible under the sun. You would love it there, Holmes. One sees quite as many nations and trades represented as in London, all jostling one another into a thousand bizarre coincidences, and you would not be surprised to find a Chinese apothecary wedged between a French milliner and an Italian wine merchant.

  “My practice was based on Front Street in a small brick building, near a number of druggist establishments, and I readily received any patients who happened my way. Poor or well-off, genteel or ruffianly, it made no difference to a boy in the first flush of his career. I’d no long-established references, and for that reason no great clientele, but it was impossible to feel small in that city, for they so prized hard work and optimism that I felt sudden successes lay every moment round the next corner.

  “One hazy afternoon, as I’d no appointments and I could see the sun lighting up the masts of the ships in the Bay, I decided I’d sat idle long enough, and set out for a bit of exercise. It is one of San Francisco’s peculiar characteristics that no matter what direction one wanders, one must encounter a steep hill, for there are seven of them, and within half an hour of walking aimlessly away from the water, I found myself striding up Nob Hill, staring in awe at the array of houses.

  “Houses, in fact, are rather a misnomer; they call it Nob Hill because it is populated by mining and railroad nabobs, and the residences are like something from the reign of Ludwig the Second or Marie Antoinette. Many are larger than our landed estates, but all built within ten years of the time I arrived. I ambled past a gothic near-castle and a neo-classicist mansion only to spy an Italianate villa across the street, each making an effort to best all others in stained glass, columns, and turrets. The neighborhood—”

  “Was a wealthy one,” Holmes sighed, hopping out of his chair to pour two glasses of claret.

  “And you would doubtless have found that section of town appalling.” I smiled at the thought of my Bohemian friend eyeing those pleasure domes with cool distaste as he handed me a wineglass. “There would have been others more to your liking, I think. Nevertheless, it was a marvel of architecture, and as I neared the crest of the hill, I stopped to take in the view of the Pacific.

  “Standing there watching the sun glow orange over the waves, I heard a door fly open and turned to see an old man hobbling frantically down a manicured path leading to the street. The mansion he’d exited was built more discreetly than most, vaguely Grecian and painted white. He was very tall—quite as tall as you, my dear fellow—but with shoulders like an ox. He dressed in a decades-old military uniform, with a tattered blue coat over his gray trousers, and a broad red tie and cloth belt, his silvery hair standing out from his head as if he’d just stepped from the thick of battle.

  “Although he cut an extraordinary figure, I would not have paid him much mind in that mad metropolis had not a young lady rushed after him in pursuit, crying out, ‘Uncle! Stop, please! You mustn’t go, I beg of you!’

  “The man she’d addressed as her uncle gained the curb not ten feet from where I stood, and then all at once collapsed onto the pavement, his chest no longer heaving and the leg which had limped crumpled underneath him.

  “I rushed to his side. He breathed, but shallowly. From my closer vantage point, I could see one of his limbs was false, and that it had come loose from its leather straps, causing his fall. The girl reached us not ten seconds later, gasping for breath even as she made a valiant effort to prevent her eyes from tearing.

  “ ‘Is he all right?’ she asked me.

  “ ‘I think so,’ I replied, ‘but I prefer to be certain. I am a doctor, and I would be happy to examine him more carefully indoors.’

  “ ‘I cannot tell you how grateful we would be. Jefferson!’ she called to a tall black servant hurrying down the path. ‘Please help us get the Colonel inside.’

  “Between the three of us, we quickly established my patient on the sofa in a cheerful, glass-walled morning room, and I was able to make a more thorough diagnosis. Apart from the carefully crafted wooden leg, which I reattached more securely, he seemed in perfect health, and if he were not such a large and apparently hale man I should have imagined that he had merely fainted.

  “ ‘Has he hurt himself, Doctor?’ the young woman asked breathlessly.

  “Despite her evident distress, I saw at once she was a beautiful woman, with a small-framed, feminine figure, and yet a large measure of that grace which goes with greater stature. Her hair was light auburn, swept away from her creamy complexion in loose waves and wound in an elegant knot, and her eyes shone golden brown through her remaining tears. She wore a pale blue dress trimmed with silver, and her ungloved hand clutched at the folds in her apprehension. She—my dear fellow, are you all right?”

  “Perfectly,” Holmes replied with another cough which, had I been in an uncharitable humor, would have resembled a chuckle. “Do go on.”

  “ ‘This man will be quite all right once he has rested,�
�� I told her. ‘My name is John Watson.’

  “ ‘Forgive me—I am Molly Warburton, and the man you’ve been tending is my uncle, Colonel Patrick Warburton. Oh, what a fright I have had! I cannot thank you enough.’

  “ ‘Miss Warburton, I wonder if I might speak with you in another room, so as not to disturb your uncle while he recovers.’

  “She led me across the hall into another tastefully appointed parlor and fell exhaustedly into a chair. I hesitated to disturb her further, and yet I felt compelled to make my anxieties known.

  “ ‘Miss Warburton, I do not think your uncle would have collapsed in such a dramatic manner had he not been under serious mental strain. Has anything occurred recently which might have upset him?’

  “ ‘Dr. Watson, you have stumbled upon a family embarrassment,’ she said softly. ‘My uncle’s mental state has been precarious for some time now, and I fear recently he—he has taken a great turn for the worse.’

  “ ‘I am sorry to hear it.’

  “ ‘The story takes some little time in telling,’ she sighed, ‘but I will ring for tea, and you will know all about it. First of all, Dr. Watson, I live here with my brother, Charles, and my uncle, the Colonel. Apart from Uncle Patrick, Charles and I have no living relatives, and we are very grateful to him for his generosity, for Uncle made a great fortune in shipping during the early days of California statehood. My brother is making his start in the photography business, and I am unmarried, so living with the Colonel is for the moment a very comfortable situation.’