For Competition 3431, you were invited to submit a passage in which Sherlock Holmes solves one of the great mysteries of our time. Many entries interpreted the ‘of our time’ bit quite loosely, with Holmes tackling the Princes in the Tower, the origins of Stonehenge and even the Big Bang. Nonetheless, after toying with pedantry, I decided to take the possibly generous line that some mysteries are for the ages and so still qualified – although in the event only one pre-21st-century mystery made the final cut. I was sorry not to have room for Richard Warren and Fay Dickinson, but the £25 vouchers go to the following.
‘I say, Holmes,’ said Watson, perusing the Daily Mail. ‘When is that Andrew chap going to get out of Royal Lodge? The king must be pretty keen for him to move to Sandringham.’
‘He won’t go there, Watson,’ said Holmes. ‘That’s just the cover story.’
‘Really? Then where?’
‘Elementary. It has to be rural England, of course, and quite prosperous. And there needs to be a supply of attractive ladies.’
‘Anything else?’
‘He is fond of celebrities. The only possible place is Midsomer, so he’ll go there as soon as the next series starts.’
‘But isn’t that just fiction for the television?’
‘Nothing wrong with fiction, Watson. We’re both fictional, after all. Besides, he’s used to it. You saw his TV interview.’
‘But dreadful things happen to newcomers to Midsomer, Holmes. Young Barnaby usually finds them dead in suspicious circumstances just before the second commercial break.’
‘Well done, Watson.’
Brian Murdoch
‘You have tracked me down, sir,’ said the middle-aged woman on the settee. ‘I applaud you. But how?’
‘Your original accent is American,’ said Holmes. ‘The inflections are of Kansas. You observe, Watson, a devil-may-care countenance, a freckled complexion suggestive of sunny prairies. Note the discomfort of skirts – the preferment of trousers – and faint indentations around the eyes from goggles. The lady is an aviator. She is, in fact, Miss Amelia Earhart.’
‘What?’ I stammered. ‘Nonsense, Holmes, impossible! Earhart’s plane plummeted into the Pacific.
‘No,’ said Holmes. ‘The disappearance was faked for an undercover mission.’
Miss Earhart smiled. ‘I was rescued by the ship Matilda Briggs, and helped to take down the Giant Rat of Sumatra.’
‘Faked your own death?’ I was indignant. ‘What in heaven’s name gave you that idea?’
Holmes merely blew a smoke ring, and gazed thoughtfully at a picture of the Reichenbach Falls.
Janine Beacham
Holmes spread out the evidence. His long, pale fingers tapped impatiently on Australian golf courses, Wisden statistics and a covert photograph of the King with Kylie Minogue. ‘Surely you see it, Watson. The lack of warm-up matches; the mid-tour holiday; the curious incident of nothing on Snicko.’
My face remained blank. Holmes sighed. ‘Think, Watson, think. You know my methods. Why would anyone go on picking Pope when his Ashes average is 17.62? In what rational universe is the new ball given to Carse instead of Tongue? How could England possibly choose not one but two useless spinners?’
‘But Holmes…’ I gasped. ‘You can’t mean…’
‘Yes, Watson. Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. If Australia is not to become a republic, England must never win the Ashes down under. This is not defeat, Watson. This is royal strategy!’
Tom Adam
‘Why would a company regularly run an empty train from Manchester to London?’ said Holmes.
‘It’s empty alright. I saw it arrive yesterday. Only the driver and his assistant alighted.’
‘So it was not empty.’ Holmes smiled. ‘Did you, by any chance, notice the driver?’
‘No, of course not. Who notices a train driver?’
‘Well, had you looked you might have observed something singular. It was the Prime Minister.’
‘The Prime Minister!’ I cried ‘You are mocking me, Holmes!’
‘No, my dear Watson, I am serious. And doubtless your next question will be, “Why on earth should the PM be driving trains?”’
‘Quite.’
‘The answer is elementary. Here is a man who knows he is about to become unemployed. What could be more sensible than to set in hand plans to join an industry whose members he has so shamelessly bribed with public money to be his friends?’
Richard Wyndham
I left my friend Holmes with his violin, tobacco and deliberations and went to the gentleman’s club. He needed time to weigh every particle of evidence, balance one hypothesis against the other, sift the essential from the immaterial or merely speculative.
Why had the Michael Mouse Peace Prize been awarded? What was Mr Fifanni Infantilo Sycophantino’s agenda? How much money was involved? And what was its connection to the Curse of the Hound of the Basketcase?
When I returned, Holmes was triumphant. ‘I have it, Watson! How were your St-Émilion Grand Cru and the mushroom vol-au-vents by the way?’
‘How did you…’
‘Never mind, Watson, I have it! It was obviously, absolutely not a matter of any form of corruption. It must therefore, by process of elimination, simply be a genuine, heartfelt tribute to the President’s unparalleled contribution to world peace, harmony and football. Elementary!’
David Silverman
No. 3434: I’ll take Manhattan
This year marks four centuries since the retrospectively controversial purchase of Manhattan island by the Dutchman Peter Minuit from a local Brooklyn tribe, supposedly for 60 guilders ($24) and possibly some beads. You are invited to submit a poem on the subject (16 lines max). Please email entries to competition@spectator.co.uk by 21 January.
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