Sherlock Holmes & the Silver Cord
“I speak of magic, Mr. Holmes.”
Mr. Percy Simmons, leader of London’s
Theosophical Order of Odic Forces, is fully aware that his is not a case which
Mr. Sherlock Holmes would ordinarily take up.
These are not ordinary times, however.
For something, some unquiet demon within
Holmes stirs into discomfiting wakefulness under the occultist’s words. The
unassuming Mr. Simmons has spoken of good and evil with the sort of certainty
of soul that Sherlock yearns for. A certainty which has eluded Holmes for the
three years in which the world thought him dead. While, for all intents,
constructions, and purposes, he was dead.
But six months ago, Sherlock Holmes
returned to Baker Street, declared himself alive to friend and foe alike, took
up his old rooms, his profession, and his partnership with Dr. J. Watson—only
to find himself haunted still by questions which had followed him out of the
dreadful chasm of Reichenbach Falls:
Why? Why had he survived when his enemy had
not? To what end? And had there ever, truly, been such a thing as justice? Such
a thing as good or evil?
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Excerpt
Intro:
Sherlock Holmes has now taken up two
new cases, the latter somewhat unsettling his emotional landscape. Now, at the
mid-point of chapter 3, he ponders his reaction to the new client’s words, a
reaction he does not wish to impart to Watson.
Extract:
[Aside: The concert which they
attend in this scene occurred on Oct 15, 1894 (a Monday) and was the second
series of Richter concerts for the year.]
Wagner has in his
compositions the innate ability to carry the listener through any number of emotional
landscapes within scant minutes’ time that rarely, if ever, tips over into
melodrama. With my conscience and imagination being somewhat raw from their
exertions, I was ready for symphonic solace. There amongst the audience at St.
James’s Hall, I found my balm for both body and mind. I could admit to it that
Simmons’ words had stirred more than my intellect. His talk of evil had
disquieted me. He had spoken of evil with as much conviction and surety as ever
I had heard and then charged me with its knowledge.
I had confronted
so-called evil in my many hundreds of cases. But could I name it? Dare I define
the malevolence which I had hunted so diligently? I could not. Even having
risked my life in service to the so-called good.
Practically
speaking, what I had said to Watson was true. This case would most likely grant
me access into an arena in which few were allowed entrance. I might learn
something of use whilst I surveyed this new unmapped section of London, the
aetherous realm of magic. Or at least I had before me a set of unknown, and
likely well-connected, practitioners who believed in and trod those airy
corridors with their arcane practices. It was new society, or a new side of
Society.
Or it was base
poison, and Mr. Simmons was victim to his own senses and I a fool. In which
event my involvement had its ordinary merits and might work in the service of
solving Mrs. Jones’ puzzling case of anti-blackmail.
No, Holmes, no.
I could pretend
to practicality. I could think and reason and have a mystery concluded at the
end of the day. But the attraction of this case . . . Evil. Good. Justice.
Crime. Power. These were concepts which I had long taken as fact. Presumed
facts which begged questions I had never wrestled with. And yet, the answers?
They might well be my soul’s defence to every action I had ever undertaken in
the service of my unique profession.
I glanced to
Watson, noting his wistful, relaxed attitude as the concert droned on around
us.
Steady Watson.
Dependable and true and, in his own way, another answer. Possibly the answer.
For why else had I returned? Who else in my life had held any sway with me? I
speak in terms of people, not precepts here. I had had my holiday. I had
enjoyed three years without a single thread binding me to this or that place,
any one responsibility save for my own to myself and the finishing of what I
had begun with Professor Moriarty. A task which ought to have ended neatly and
without any loose ends at the edge of a cliff outside of Meiringen. But to
close the entry on Moriarty was to bury my own acknowledgement that I had been
cavalier with my own life and with Watson’s.
This, and every
other guilt, had arisen in me at Simmons’ call.
What Watson did
not understand—what I could never tell him, for it would mean my having to say
it aloud, to admit it at all—was that my work served to keep me from that
terrible precipice of fear which lived at the heart of cold logic. Fear which
Mr. Simmons had sounded alongside every other sin of mine when he stood in the
doorway of our sitting room and proclaimed that I knew justice, that I
understood evil.
Wrong on both
counts, Mr. Simmons.
But if I could
learn its contours, if there was a systematic proof, a morality to be gleaned
from data and fact? Then this case which he had presented to me had the power
to solve my ideological dilemma, that of evil. A question which had haunted me
every waking day since Moriarty’s demise at my hands.
Author
Bio – M. K. Wiseman has degrees in Interarts &
Technology and Library & Information Studies from the University of
Wisconsin-Madison. Her office, therefore, is a curious mix of storyboards and
reference materials. Both help immensely in the writing of historical novels.
She currently resides in Cedarburg, Wisconsin.
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