[Mycroft Holmes 06] • Mycroft Holmes · The Case of the Romanov Pearls

Lazy, corpulent and clever, Mycroft, elder brother of Sherlock Holmes, is back with a new adventure by David Dickinson in the series widely praised for its fidelity to the Conan Doyle originals.

Silence is golden at the Diogenes, Mycroft's Pall Mall club. You are only allowed to speak in the Stranger’s Room. But for William St John Plunkett neither silence nor speech is an option any more. He is found dead at the bottom of the great staircase, blood and brains spattered all over the marble floor.

Mycroft, although in the club at the time, leaves the details of the investigation to Inspector Lestrade, including the baffling geography of the Diogenes with its library called Plato's Cave and a dining room called Secundus the Silent. Eccentrics roam the building, Cholmondeley Warner with his matchstick cathedrals, Fitzpaine Somerset, bankrupted by grandfather clocks, the corpse himself, obsessed with attending funerals.

Inspector Lestrade is lost in the silent world of club land. Mycroft's health is failing, but he summons all his powers to resolve the murder mystery on his own doorstep. As the police close in on the killer Mycroft seems to be at death's door. ‘You must live for your country,’ his young assistant Tobias tells him, ‘you must live for England. England needs you.’