As I rounded the corner, my foot landed squarely in a large pile of horse manure. An unpleasant experience in normal circumstances, this incident was worsened by a simple application of physics: an object in motion stays in motion. Hence, without the benefit of friction against the sole of my Oxford, my right foot and leg were suddenly moving at a different angle than the rest of my nearly fifteen-stone body. Anticipating a both painful and embarrassing conclusion to this accident, I was surprised to feel my fall suddenly arrested.
“There now, old chap, you must not fall behind. The chase is afoot,” Holmes said as he helped return me to my feet.
I knew not what surprised me more: the fact that he interrupted a foot chase to give me assistance, or the play on words which was far beneath his usual sense of dry humor.
“Damn,” I swore, glad my wife was not around to hear. She had quite strong convictions about what language was not appropriate outside of an army camp. “My carelessness has cost us our quarry. He has disappeared.”
“Fear not, my dear Watson, I see him in the panel beneath us. I will simply jump the border and cut him off,” Holmes announced confidently.
Turning to look askance at my oldest of friends, I discovered that Holmes was nowhere to be seen. Between his strange words and his impossible disappearing act, I was at a complete loss for what to do.
Where conscious thought failed me, my training as both a soldier and a physician took over. I closed my eyes, took a few deep breaths to slow my heartbeat, and focused inwardly. As soon as my mind settled, I was able to make out the sounds of a commotion roughly a block away. I paused only a moment to shake off the larger chunks of manure from my Oxford, and then ran towards those sounds.
As I expected, I saw something quite impossible. Holmes stood on the far side of a narrow street, blocking the path of our quarry, Mr. James Whitman. Unable to maneuver past Holmes, Mr. Whitman fled wildly in the opposite direction, where he was abruptly met by my clenched fist.
“Excellent display of fisticuffs, Watson. Now let us deliver Mr. Whitman to the constable,” Holmes said while helping me detain our suspect.
Overpowered by two men who both had greater strength of limbs than he, Mr. Whitman gave no struggle as we escorted him to Scotland Yard. His submissiveness gave me time to ponder what I had seen this afternoon.
I was highly familiar with the streets of London in this section of the city. In point of fact, I had walked that particular lane scores, if not hundreds, of times before. I knew for a fact that there simply was no path that Holmes could have taken to reach the far side of that lane before Mr. Whitman had reached the end of it. The shortest possible path to do so was a good three blocks longer than the route Mr. Whitman had taken.
I could try asking Holmes how he had performed that trick, but I knew from experience he would not provide an alternative answer to the one he had already provided: something about panels and borders. I understood all the words he had used. However, the context of the explanation simply eluded me.
When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.
Holmes must have spoken that phrase to me at least fifty times during various cases over the years. The words echoed in my head as I pondered the events of the day. Could a man run three blocks in less than ten seconds? My study of biology said that was impossible. In fact, no known land mammal could perform that feat, even if Holmes had been able to procure a mount for this chase. Some aves could fly to that location in the time frame, but none capable of that feat could carry Holmes’s weight.
Therefore, Holmes did not travel by foot, mount, or air. The only remaining possibility was that he defied the laws of physics in order to apprehend Mr. Whitman. Having eliminated the impossible, I found myself forced to consider something else equally impossible.
I did grudgingly give the idea consideration, for this was not the first time I had witnessed Holmes perform a feat that could only be described as impossible. A few years prior, during a perplexing case, we had been walking down a busy city street when Holmes quite suddenly apprehended a woman passing by. Mortified that my closest friend would act in such a base way I demanded that he release the lady. Instead, he asked her a single question, pertinent to the case on which we were working. Inexplicably, the answer she returned provided the solution to a case that had confused us for weeks.
After both apologizing for our ungentlemanly behavior and thanking her for her assistance, I questioned Holmes about his behavior.
“Whatever came over you, Holmes, and how could you possibly have known that woman had key information about the case?”
His response provided little illumination to my query. “Elementary, my dear Watson. The inker always draws thicker lines around the faces of important characters.”
Such frustratingly incomprehensible answers were common when I questioned his unusual feats of intuition. For example, quite often when questioning a suspect, he would stare at empty space above the suspect’s head rather than look into his or her eyes, like Inspector Lestrade was wont to do during an interrogation. Despite his seeming fascination with the cloudy London sky, Holmes always gleaned critical information from these interrogations. When I inquired into what he was staring at so intently, his response was just two words: “Thought bubbles.”
This speculation ran roughshod through my mind throughout the trip to Scotland Yard. By the time we had delivered Mr. Whitman to the constable I had made no more progress on this conundrum than I previously had. I was quite tempted to question Holmes again when he started speaking.
“Quickly, old chap, let us return to my flat. We have much to speak about,” Holmes said, more animated than I had seen him in quite some time.
“Should we not stay here and wait for the police to interrogate Mr. Whitman?”
“No need, my dear Watson,” he replied casually. “I am confident our friends at the Yard will pummel the answers out of Mr. Whitman eventually, but I already know the whereabouts of young Miss Highland. I will explain everything once I am enjoying a pipe in my sitting room.”
Delaying the recovery of the young kidnapped woman by even a moment concerned me, but I had learned over the years to trust the judgment of Holmes. As a result, we spoke not a word to each other as we traveled back to Baker Street.
“Mind the manure,” Holmes said, looking pointedly at my Oxford just before we reached his flat. Mortified that I had forgotten such a detail, I carefully scraped the hardening manure off my shoe on the nearby curb until I was satisfied that I would not dirty his home.
Minutes passed while Holmes started a small fire in the hearth, changed into his usual smoking jacket, and rummaged through a little-used drawer for a tin of tobacco. The last action seemed quite peculiar, since his favorite tobacco was clearly visible on an end table.
Holmes raised a hand just as I was about to point this out, halting my words. “I can see from your demeanor, my dear friend, your patience grows thin. Allow me to put your mind at ease. When I stated earlier that I knew the whereabouts of Miss Highland, I slightly misled you. I know not where she is at the moment. Rather, I know where she will be at a specific future time.”
“Where and when?” I queried.
“Miss Highland will be found at Reichenbach Falls during the next heavy rainfall,” he replied with such confidence that I felt no urge to question the veracity of these facts, no matter how ludicrous they seemed. “Should you feel the need to look out the window, you will notice that it is an unusually sunny day for the normally overcast city of London. It will be quite some time until there is heavy rainfall and I fully intend to enjoy myself until then.”
True to his word, he filled his favorite pipe with a pinch of tobacco from the mysterious tin. After lighting it at the fireplace, he sat upon his favorite armchair and took three long draws. He then carefully set the pipe down on an end table, drew his violin and bow from the nearby stand, and started to play vigorously.
Pausing only briefly now and then to take a long, hard puff on his pipe, for the better part of an hour Holmes played on his violin a somber song that, though I vaguely recognized, I could not put a name to. It was not that unusual for him to play so relentlessly, even when entertaining company, but I could sense that something was amiss.
In every single previous instance when I did witness him playing his violin while still in the midst of a case, he did so to clear and focus his mind. This time, however, he seemed more intent on simply enjoying the purity of his art. Furthermore, unless my eyes deceived me, I believed the mystery tin from which he filled his pipe was the tobacco he had brought back from Morocco. He had previously described the act of smoking that snuff as thoroughly incorrigible unless a dear friend has recently passed, the Royal Mother has just given birth, or you expect to succumb to the cold fingers of death in less than a day. I was quite certain neither of the first two were true.
Holmes must have detected some trace of my growing concern in my demeanor, for he quite suddenly ceased to fiddle and returned his violin and bow to the stand.
“Fear not, Watson, I have no intent to do harm to my person. In point of fact, even if I did intend myself harm I would be unable to achieve it.”
This statement, so insightful of the thoughts running through my mind, did little to still the concern I felt. Quite to the contrary, if truth be told.
“I see in your eyes that you have many questions you wish to ask me, Watson. I promise I will provide answers. However, I must ask that you forestall your questions for a time and simply allow my meandering wit to set the stage.”
Concerned as I was, I could not deny his request. “I will hold my tongue, Holmes,” I responded.
“To start off, I must offer my deepest apologies,” he said. I held to my word and stilled my tongue, though I found myself quite distressed by the unusual degree of sincerity in his words.
“For years now you have been my dearest friend and quite often my only companion. That you would choose to accept this burden despite my boorishness and cocksure attitude speaks greatly of the patient and loyal person that you are. You have endured the sharp lash of my ego like no other person in the world.”
The truth of his words was such that I briefly expected the light of Heaven to shine down upon him. Alas, only a wisp of pipe smoke drifted towards the ceiling to mark the occasion.
“For all this, you deserve to be rewarded, either in this life or in the next. Sadly, I can make no promises for the grace of God, and the only reward I can offer in life is a pale substitute to what you deserve.”
“You deserve to spend your final hours in the sitting room of your home, sharing pleasant conversation with and the warm embrace of your dear wife Mary. Instead, I know for a fact that you will spend every remaining moment in my tiresome company. It is for that final indignity that I feel I must apologize.”
So disturbed was I by this statement, I broke my oath and exclaimed, “Holmes, what exactly are you saying?”
Only raising an eyebrow at my outburst, he said, “Pour yourself a glass of scotch and take a seat. My explanation will not be short and you will find much of it quite implausible.
“I will start by noting that, for quite some time now, you have been pondering numerous mysterious actions and statements I have made. You need not acknowledge this fact. It has been quite apparent from our many interactions.
“From your recent reactions to these peculiarities, I can deduce that you have come to accept that no school of science with which you are familiar can properly explain what you have observed. I must congratulate you for this deduction. You are quite correct that science offers no explanation.”
He briefly tamped some more snuff into his pipe, as much to give me a moment to process what he had said, I suspected, as to refill it.
“Though it pains me to the quick, we must discard science and accept that some other power holds sway. I have neither the time nor tools to identify this power. It may be an act of God, some unholy mystical power, or possibly even some scientific principle so advanced that the greatest scholars on this planet could not understand it with a lifetime of study. I am of the mind that the details of the how are of no importance. Only the results of this power should concern us.”
“You, I, and everyone we know, have known, or will ever know are all characters in a story. This story is presented in a series of illustrated novellas, colloquially known as ‘comic books.’ For reasons of which I am unaware, I am the only character in these stories that appears to be aware of these facts.”
Ever astute, Holmes recognized that I was about to respond to this seemingly preposterous explanation and derailed my interruption of his story. “Please, my friend, drink another tot and hold your tongue. I am quite certain I can answer all of your questions without you needing to utter them.
“I am aware of these facts because, from all appearances, I have the unique ability to see beyond the confines of the story. I can literally see the lines that form the pictures, the white spaces that surround the illustration panels, the curiously informal lettering used to depict conversations, and even the small metal clasps that hold the pages of the book together. Beyond that, I can see and hear the author, the artist, and the inker when they plan stories or simply have conversations near the most recent book in production.
“My awareness of this world that we live in grants me the ability to perform seemingly impossible feats. I can look ahead to future panels or even read the storyboards in order to predict future events. What you have perceived in the past as impossibly rapid movement is nothing more than me jumping to a future panel, sometimes on the next page. Finally, as you have suspected, I can read thoughts as easily as I read the words that people speak. Fear not, my old friend, I bear no ill will toward you for unkind thoughts about me.”
Backing his words with action, he stood up from his chair and crossed the room to top off my glass of scotch. Seemingly satisfied that he had been a good host, he returned to his armchair.
“At this very moment I am certain that you are considering which asylum will offer me the best chance to recover from my obvious brain malady. In truth, if such a solution could protect me from my fate, I would gladly submit myself to treatment. Unfortunately, I know for a fact that my life will be ended before the final page of this book.”
Flummoxed by this ominous pronouncement, I downed the remainder of my glass, refilled it, and downed that as well. From time to time in the past I had witnessed Holmes speak with such intensity that it was nothing less than blasphemy to doubt his words. This was one of those moments. Despite that, the logical part of my mind refused to accept the possibility of what he proposed. To the keen eye of Holmes, this mental conflict was clearly visible.
“You are conflicted, old chap,” he continued. “You don’t completely understand all of the terminology I have used, nor can you accept such an abrupt challenge to your reality. I sympathize. I had years to adapt to our reality. You have been given mere seconds.
“It is my intention to convince you of the truth of my words. With any luck I will do so before we leave this room. Before I can provide this evidence, my friend, I must first reveal to you important facts about the author of the story we inhabit.”
Upon saying those words, Holmes carefully placed his pipe down, sat up straight, and looked directly at me with his piercing eyes. I had seen him in this position before and knew it meant that the conversation at hand had his full focus.
“The author is a gentleman, though I use the term loosely, known as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. He is a celebrated individual in the British Empire, both for past deeds that he is reputed to have performed in a conflict known as the Falklands War and for the ongoing Sherlock Holmes story that he writes. He is not a particularly skilled writer, primarily trading in on his prior fame.
“In addition to being a mediocre writer, he is an incredibly arrogant man. So prideful is he that he has written himself into his own story as the primary antagonist, the one individual who has successfully eluded the protagonist multiple times throughout the narrative.
“Now that Doyle has chosen to end the story, he has decided that his protagonist, namely me, will finally achieve a measure of success against Arthur Doyle. Because I am not scripted to survive until the end of the issue, I must reveal the details of Mr. Doyle’s crime in advance of the conclusion, so that you may reveal those details at the end of the story in your final journal entry about your adventures with Mr. Holmes. In answer to your obvious question, Watson, individual comic books are referred to as issues in much the same way that individual newspapers are similarly referenced.”
Holmes paused briefly after that last statement to savor both a draw of his pipe and his ability to forestall my questions. Only seconds passed before he continued.
“To be quite precise, the storyboard for this panel says ‘Holmes spends some pleasant time with Watson in his sitting room before explaining in detail what he has deduced of the crimes of Arthur Doyle.’ Despite my abilities to act beyond the reality I inhabit, my actions are as much bound by the storyboards for this comic book as are the actions of every other character. Fortunately, this particular storyboard offers an excellent opportunity.
“The lack of specificity in relation to time means that I can spend as long in this room as I want, as long as I am enjoying myself. This scene will only end once I have explained the details of the crimes of Arthur Doyle to you. In due time, I will do exactly that, however not as the author intended. I will explain to you how Sir Arthur Conan Doyle engaged in the crime of stolen valor, obtaining a knighthood through deceit, a feat that I am only capable of because of the hubris of the author. You, my friend, will be able to reveal those crimes to the readership of this comic book because the storyboard for the final scene says ‘Dr. Watson pays his final respects to Holmes by recording in his journal the information Holmes has deduced about the crimes of Arthur Doyle.’
“To be perfectly honest, my determination to follow this course of action derives in equal parts from a sense of justice and from spite. Mr. Doyle could have ended my story any way he chose, and he chose to end it with my death. That death is now inevitable and that fact has stoked my anger. I feel no guilt, however, since Mr. Doyle is a scourge on the honor of the country I hold so dear.”
His final word of that sentence was accompanied by Holmes slamming his hand down upon the armrest of his chair. Such displays of anger were rare from Holmes and usually only directed at the foulest of miscreants. He took a moment to compose himself before continuing.
“Of course, for my plan to succeed, I must convince you of the truth of my words. I am asking a boon of you, my dearest friend, not forcing your hand. I would not see justice and vengeance performed unless you are my willing accomplice in this endeavor.
“To this end, I will attempt to convince you in a manner consistent with your profession. We will engage in a series of repeatable experiments that produce reproducible and observable results. During the experimentation I will endeavor to teach you to play chess with greater expertise. The experiments will come to an end the moment that you defeat me in a game of chess. At that time, I will fully explain the details of the crimes of both Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the author, and Arthur Doyle, the character, giving you the choice of which you will record in your journal.”
A bemused look briefly crossed his face. “It just occurred to me, Watson. If you are willing to oblige my request, I will even provide you the perfect title for this little adventure.”
Leaning further back in his armchair, Holmes took a very long draw of his pipe, making it quite clear that he had completed his storytelling and that I was once again free to speak. Despite all the thoughts racing through my head, I was at a complete loss for words, not just because of the impossibility he described, but because he intended for me to defeat him at a game of chess.
In the years in which we had been compatriots, we had played innumerable games of chess. Never once had I defeated him. More accurately, never once had I offered a tangible challenge. His skill in the game so surpassed mine that I suspected it would take a decade or more to teach me to play well enough to defeat him in a fair game.
The impossible task which he had set himself apparently did not deter him at all, for Holmes had already started to rearrange the room so that we could play chess in comfort. Without deviating from his task, he casually said, “Watson, old chap, why don’t you pour us each a glass of that Merlot from the wine rack on the far side of the room?”
A peculiar lilt in his tone told me that the man was up to something, but I was game enough to play along. First, grabbing a pair of glasses from the nearby cupboard, I started towards the other end of the room. I must emphasize now that I only ever started the journey, for try as hard as I might, I simply could not reach the other side of the room. I could see it, and my feet moved in that direction, yet my steps made no discernible progress.
Finally frustrated beyond description, I exclaimed, “What madness is this, Holmes? I walk but do not move.”
“Elementary, my dear Watson,” he responded. “The portion of the room you are attempting to access isn’t illustrated in the panel. Therefore, since you cannot leave the panel, you cannot reach that side of the room.”
Incredulous about his declaration, I turned abruptly to face Holmes. “That is…”
“Preposterous?” he interrupted. “Indubitably so. It is also the only logical deduction that can be made based on the given facts. However, it is of no importance. I see from your disposition that you are not yet convinced, and delving further into this oddity will not change your mind. You require additional evidence, as any good man of science should.”
“Since the Merlot is unavailable, please pour us some more scotch instead. It is an excellent year after all.”
Briefly calming myself first, I responded to his request. “I am sorry, my friend. I emptied the bottle earlier.”
“No need to apologize,” he said. “If you look in the cabinet, you will discover the very same bottle, full to the same level it was when you first broached it earlier. Please at least look before you object, old chap.”
Sighing inwardly at how efficiently he had headed off my protestations, I walked over to the cabinet and looked inside. Resting in the cabinet, in the exact location where the previous bottle of scotch had been situated, was a bottle of scotch. By all visual indications it appeared to be the same brand and year as the bottle I had emptied earlier. Turning my head, I could also see that the empty bottle I had left on the end table was nowhere to be seen.
Thinking carefully, I was quite certain that the cabinet had been empty after I had removed the bottle of scotch earlier. It was possible that Holmes had somehow simultaneously secreted this bottle into the cabinet and discarded the empty bottle all while my back was turned, though such behavior was highly unlike the man. Still, it was a possible explanation, which meant this experiment had proven nothing. Rather than inform Holmes of my deductions, I simply poured the requested scotch and left the bottle in the cabinet.
By the time I had turned around, Holmes had already finished setting up the game and was concealing a pawn in each hand. After sitting down, I selected a hand, which Holmes opened to reveal the black pawn. Smiling more genuinely than I had ever witnessed before, he said, “The game is afoot.”
I lost a game of chess. Then I lost a second game of chess, followed by a third, a fourth, and a fifth. I continued to lose games of chess until I lost count. Hours turned to days which turned to weeks, or so I assume. I lost all concept of time while I played and lost chess games.
The light coming in through the windows never changed while Holmes and I played chess. The fire in the hearth never wavered. The small tin of tobacco from which Holmes filled his pipe never emptied. The bottle of scotch in the cabinet never ran dry.
Holmes and I simply drank scotch and played chess as he meticulously endeavored to ingrain in me his entire encyclopedic knowledge of the game. He had no substantial skills as an educator. However, through example and repetition, he was able to teach me increasingly advanced strategies.
Over time I came to understand the Zukertort Opening, Larsen’s Opening, Philidor Defence, Dutch Defence, the Lucena Position, and hundreds of other complex tactics. My vocabulary expanded to include concepts like pawn structure, windmill, deflection, prophylaxis, and compensation. While I had rarely looked more than a move or two ahead before today, I had learned to look as far as ten moves ahead and regularly did so.
I continued to lose every single game. However, I presented a more difficult challenge with the passage of time. Fate eventually smiled upon me and a hard-fought game ended in a draw. Holmes exulted in this draw even more than I did and doubled his efforts to improve my mastery of the game.
I played so many games that they all blended together in my thoughts. The moment one game ended Holmes was immediately resetting the board for the next. Maybe a hundred games after that draw, possibly more, I recognized something quite intriguing. Playing was becoming easier for me with each game I played. Thought transformed to instinct that had been honed by constant practice. Simultaneously, Holmes was taking increasingly more time to make his moves and would often sweat due to stress. I hadn’t just become better at the game. I was pushing Holmes to the absolute limits of his skill.
“18,732 games. Congratulations,” Holmes said as he lay down his king in the traditional acknowledgement of defeat. “As promised, I will now explain the details of the crimes that both Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Arthur Doyle have engaged in. Please listen carefully.”
Dusk fell while he gave his explanations. After the final words left his lips, he continued to rest in his armchair smoking his pipe. My mind wrestled with the events I had just experienced and the tales I had heard. Accepting this bizarre story as truth was incredibly tempting. It was, after all, presented to me by an individual that I had come to accept as the foremost logician in the world.
How long I sat in that comfortable armchair, wrestling with this quandary and smelling sweet pipe smoke, I knew not. I only knew that I woke up many hours later as a chill wind ripped through the open window. The fire had died out during the night, as had Holmes’s pipe. Dark clouds filled the sky and strong winds whipped the curtains into a frenzy. I quickly closed the window and woke up Holmes.
“Holmes, we must make haste,” I exclaimed. “A heavy rain approaches even as we tarry.”
Groggy but as level-headed as ever, Holmes extricated himself from his armchair and carefully set the room in order. In my years as a doctor I had seen many men who were on the brink of death, and to my trained eyes Holmes seemed very much like a man putting his house in order for the last time. He moved quickly, with no wasted action, taking only one last sweeping look around the room before adjusting his jacket and marching towards the door.
We hailed a carriage upon exiting his flat. Holmes gave precise directions to the driver and paid him up front, for both the trip there and back, before settling into the compartment with me. Only as he sat down did it occur to me that I hadn’t the slightest clue where Reichenbach Falls were.
“Holmes,” I asked, looking nervously at the dark clouds, “where are these falls and how long will it take us to reach them?”
“They are in Switzerland,” he said without a trace of concern in his voice.
“Switzerland?” I exclaimed. “There is no way we can reach Switzerland by carriage. We will need to take a ship. It will be days before we arrive, if we are lucky.”
He responded with a wry grin. “Fear not, old chap. Doyle is as inept in his understanding of geography as he is as a writer. He believes the falls to be located near Kettering, which he further believes will take slightly less than an hour to reach by carriage. Neither is factual. However it matters not, for the next panel is labeled ‘Fifty Minutes Later.’”
According to my pocket watch, the carriage arrived at a wooded glen less than a kilometer from the top of the falls exactly fifty minutes later, to the second. It was just one more oddity that added to the mountain of evidence supporting Holmes’s outlandish claims. I had begun to wonder if I was the one in need of an asylum due to my refusal to accept the only logical conclusion of this mountain of evidence. If Holmes recognized my wavering doubt, he uncharacteristically said nothing, instead proceeding briskly towards the falls in silence.
The scene that met us at Reichenbach Falls was highly unexpected. Professor James Moriarty, a gentleman that Holmes and I had tangled with in past cases, stood near the river, looking in our direction as if he had been expecting us. A young lady with blonde tresses, whom I could only assume was Miss Highland, stood in the raging river behind him. A makeshift dam that was slowly filling with water surrounded the young lady, who appeared to be tied to some object in the dam.
Having met Moriarty multiple times in the past, I knew him to be a highly cultured gentleman. This type of raw thuggery was beneath him. Hoping that I might appeal to his more enlightened nature, I attempted conversation.
“Professor Moriarty, please consider what you do here today.”
Before I could say any more, Holmes interrupted. “Do not waste your breath, Watson. The professor only follows the script. Doyle could think of no less base way to create this scene than a kidnapping, no matter how out of character it was for the perpetrator. No words you or I utter, no matter how honeyed, will enjoin him to deviate from this behavior. We must, instead, act swiftly if we are to rescue Miss Highland.”
True to his words, Holmes dashed forward.
“Halt,” Moriarty ordered, drawing a pistol from his coat pocket.
Holmes didn’t even flinch as the weapon moved in line with his torso. Showing bravery that I could not recall witnessing in any individual during my entire time in the military, he grabbed hold of Moriarty, with one hand on his arm and the other on the pistol. Despite his firm grip on the weapon, he made no effort to move the barrel out of line with his torso.
“Have you gone mad, Holmes?” I yelled over the roar of the waterfall. “He will shoot you.”
“Fear not, Watson,” he replied, “I am in no danger. I have seen the panel where the pistol fires. It is a full-page spread that is a close-up image of just Moriarty’s hand, the pistol, and the blast. My hand is not in that image. As long as I maintain my grip on this weapon, I can assure you that it will not fire. Now, my dearest friend, take advantage of this opportunity to save Miss Highland before the river waters overwhelm her.”
As much as I feared madness had finally overtaken my oldest companion, I could not in good conscience allow a young woman to die due to my inaction. Certain that I would hear a deafening blast any second now, I sprinted in the direction of the hostage. Holmes’s statement proved true, however. The two struggled while I ran towards Miss Highland, but despite the fact that his finger never left the trigger and the barrel was pointed directly at Holmes, Moriarty never fired the weapon.
Thanking the good Lord for this miracle, I bent over to help Miss Highland, only to discover that she was quite suddenly wearing manacles.
“Holmes,” I called out, “I am unable to free her. She is wearing manacles, not ropes.”
Never taking his eyes off his opponent, he responded, “The manacles are a mistake by the artist. The original draft called for manacles. The final draft called for rope. Unfortunately, the idiot artist forgot to correct one of the panels before print. The rope will return after Miss Highland screams.”
At almost that exact moment a strong rush of water washed over the dam, briefly covering Miss Highland. She screamed in fear the instant her head broke the water. When I turned back to face her, just as Holmes had predicted, the manacles were nowhere to be seen, replaced once again by simple rope.
Briefly putting the philosophical conundrum of my reality out of mind, I waded into the chill waters of the river and attacked the rope with fervor. The rope had swollen due to the water, increasing the difficulty of loosening the knots. Long minutes passed before I was finally able to free the sobbing young lady.
Once free of her bonds, she desperately clawed her way out of the river onto the shore. Wild with fear, she instantly ran away from the river, fortuitously heading in the direction of the carriage.
Then the world shattered.
At least, for an instant, that is what I truly believed. Still waist-deep in the water, I found myself momentarily blinded and deafened while I struggled to maintain my footing. My vision cleared before the ringing in my ears abated, revealing the reason I had been dazed. A tree located less than five meters away had been struck by lightning. The trunk, split down the middle, burned, even in the heavy downpour.
Surprisingly, neither Holmes nor Moriarty appeared to have been affected by the lightning strike at all. They were still locked in their seemingly endless struggle. Miss Highland was not as lucky. The burning tree was barely a meter from her and she had been knocked to the ground. From all appearances she was still conscious, but had fully succumbed to panic, curled in a ball, unwilling or unable to move.
To my horror, the base of the tree cracked again, beginning a slow fall of the tree itself towards the cowering young lady. Still standing in the river, I was certain that I was too far away to possibly reach her in time. Holmes, however, was not.
Acceptance flashed across his face as he deliberately released Moriarty and dashed towards the paralyzed Miss Highland. The tree sprayed mud on both Holmes and Miss Highland when it crashed to the ground, but missed them both due to Holmes’s quick thinking.
The brave rescue, however, was not the focus of my attention. My eyes were firmly fixed upon the pistol Moriarty held. With growing horror, my field of vision dimmed until the only thing I could see was his hand and the pistol.
His hand and the pistol and a small cloud of smoke drifting out of the barrel.
In that instant, a similar acceptance washed over me. I knew for certain how this story was going to end, and the part I was going to play in it.
Holmes also had one last part to play in this story. Between my time in the military and my years as a doctor, I instantly knew that the bullet had struck a lung. It was a mortal wound that would kill him in seconds. Holmes, I suspect, knew it as well. Gathering what remained of his strength, Holmes lunged at Moriarty, carrying him into the river, and then seconds later over the falls.
I already knew the fate of Holmes and cared not about the fate of Moriarty. His role in this story was complete. My role was not.
The return trip to London seemed to take but a moment. I suspected that the artist simply didn’t bother to illustrate it. The result of this strange time dilation was that Miss Highland was returned to her family that very day, and I soon found myself sitting at my desk in my study. Taking quill in hand, I started a new entry in my journal.
May 14th, 1891
Today marks my final journal entry about the adventures of Sherlock Holmes. The great detective, nay, the great man, lost his life today in an act of true heroism. While I would love to tarry on the details of his act of bravery, that would not truly pay tribute to his life.
Instead, I will do as he bade me in his final days and reveal the details of a crime committed by the one criminal he never successfully brought to justice. The facts I will present here shortly were revealed to me by Holmes to ensure that, should he be unable to divulge them, they would not be lost from the world. It is my intention, upon completing this journal entry, to share its content with the detectives at Scotland Yard, in hopes that justice is brought upon the foul miscreant for the base acts in which he has engaged. I can think of no greater tribute to the remarkable mind that has passed from this world.
As Holmes explained to me, the following was information that he deduced based on his observations of the primary malefactor, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and conversations that Holmes was privy to between Doyle and his equally unethical lifelong artist friend, Alexander Reynolds, a man willing to keep his secret in order to profit from Doyle’s fame.
Doyle was a man of little note until he was deployed to fight in a conflict named the Falklands War. Why such a man, completely unqualified to represent the honor of the British Empire, was ever allowed onto the field of battle was beyond even the formidable deductive skills of Holmes to comprehend.
Whatever the reason, Doyle unsurprisingly bore himself without an ounce of dignity upon being deployed. His lasting legacy would have undoubtedly been of nothing more than acts of cowardice had his squad not been ambushed one morning. The ambush was quite effective, reducing the squad to two individuals after a brief firefight: Private Doyle and Sergeant Norman West.
Sergeant West was an exceptional soldier, the pride of the British Empire. Despite having received a critical wound during the initial ambush, he continued to fight the Argentinian soldiers. Through skill, and I must assume some incredible luck, he succeeded in killing the remaining five enemy combatants, without any assistance from the cowardly Doyle. Sadly, Sergeant West died for Queen and country that day, succumbing to the injury sustained during the ambush.
This tale of heroism has never been made public. Upon returning to his company, Doyle claimed that he was responsible for killing the entire ambushing force. An investigation by the military confirmed the details of his story, resulting in military commendations and eventually being knighted for his deed.
To whomever is reading this journal, let it be known that this act of stolen glory remained a secret to all but Doyle, his greedy compatriot Reynolds, Holmes, and I, until this day. Please see this information is used to bring honor to the deceased Sergeant West and to bring justice to Arthur Doyle for his crimes against the British Empire.
Thus ends the Adventure of the Double-Sized Final Issue.