The Pandora Plague: A Posthumous Memoir of John H. Watson M.D. Read online

  THE PANDORA PLAGUE

  A Posthumous Memoir of

  John H. Watson, M.D .

  As Edited by

  Lee A. Matthias

  Copyright © 2011 by Lee A. Matthias

  Revised Third Edition for Kindle

  All rights reserved,

  including the right of reproduction,

  in whole, or in part, in any form,

  without written permission.

  Interior Layout, Design, & Art by

  Kaitlin L. Matthias & Lee A. Matthias

  Sherlock Holmes and John H. Watson, M.D. are alive and well in each of the many Scion Societies of the Baker Street Irregulars.

  Visit these Holmes & Watson-related Websites:

  www.bakerstreetjournal.com

  www.sherlockian.net

  For My Parents

  Vivian & Arthur Matthias

  Author’s Note

  T he story of this book is nearly as full of dramatic highs and lows as the story within it. Though the idea of associating Sherlock Holmes and Harry Houdini has occurred to writers more than once,* this book has, itself, been previously published twice . In the first instance, it was by a mass market New York publisher who announced imminent bankruptcy just a few weeks after the first printing went out. The book never reached full distribution, and the publisher never did file for bankruptcy. Instead the company was “rescued” by its CEO and principle stock-holder. After a time they re-surfaced, this time, exclusively as a romance publisher: “No mysteries, please.”

  Three years passed. I went on to other things. Then I got a call from a small, regional press that wanted to publish the book. I accepted. The publisher brought out an edited version of the book—8,000 words shorter, cut for budgetary reasons. I had asked an artist friend of mine to try working up a cover, and he did a marvelous job. The original line drawing that was the basis for the painted cover of the Second Edition is on this book. I want to thank the Second Edition’s publisher, Larry Names, for his consent for our use of that artwork. The book went out in a limited printing, and a similarly limited distribution, despite its publisher’s best efforts. Eventually, it went out of print and faded away again. So it has never seen the inside of many bookstores, nor resided on many shelves, to be picked up and slowly dog-eared.

  Anyway, by this time, I was (again) onto other things, and the original manuscript had gone into that proverbial writer’s “drawer.”

  I married, wrote scripts, taught screenwriting, and, in a fit of indomitable resolve, learned the publishing business, working as a literary agent. I sold books to publishers and scripts to producers (including a couple episodes of "Star Trek: The Next Generation," and "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine!”). Once (over eleven stress-filled days), I even managed to auction a client's book for more than half a million dollars.

  Then, Print-On-Demand technology arrived, and with it the possibility that the book might never go out of print again. I looked over at that drawer...

  * As far as I can tell, the idea of linking Sherlock Holmes with Harry Houdini in print has occurred to three people. First (as I found out after writing this book), to an obscure German writer (and plagiarist ?) around 1906; next, to me in early 1977; and most recently to “Sherlockian,” magician, and author, Daniel Stashower, whose novel, “The Adventure of the Ectoplasmic Man,” was first published in 1985. He was kind enough to exchange signed copies with me when his book first appeared. Mr. Stashower has since gone on to write much more fiction involving both Holmes and Houdini. In my own case, I have my eye on another direction for the great detective. I have recently come across an obscure sheaf of yellowed pages suggesting an association involving S.H., Thomas Edison , Nicola Tesla , Professor George Edward Challenger , and a fabled continent from pre-history. Should it prove genuine, I may release it for publication.

  Acknowledgments

  T he “editor” wishes to express his appreciation to the many people who helped or inspired him to put this project into final form. First, of course, is Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes. One could not easily write a Holmes story without consulting the four major Sherlockian scholars: William S. Baring-Gould, Leslie S. Klinger, Michael Harrison, and Vincent Starrett. Among others, Adrian Conan Doyle, John Dickson Carr, Nicholas Meyer, Samuel Rosenberg, Charles Higham, Ronald Burt de Waal, Jack Tracy, Peter Haining, and Richard L. Boyer also deserve special acknowledgment.

  For accurate information on Harry Houdini, Milbourne Christopher and Walter Gibson, together, have the last word on the man and his career.

  Among the Houdini authorities, William L. Gresham, Arnold Furst, and Dr. Bernard C. Meyer (Nicholas’s father) were most helpful.

  For the cultivation of my strong interest in magic, my friend since grade school, magician and illusionist, David Seebach (www.davidseebach.com), must be mentioned here. David inspired me initially by writing a pair of short Holmes pastiches when he was the summer entertainment at a resort in northern Wisconsin, and he helped conceive the beginnings of what became "The Pandora Plague" on a road trip we took to upstate New York for one of his engagements, one gray winter day. I recall that we stopped numerous times at bookstores along the way, gathering research materials. David’s own researches also recovered another of the legion of “lost” cases, “The Adventure of the Caramel-Worker’s Passion,” referred to in this volume. Please direct all inquiries as to the date of its publication to him.

  I also must acknowledge my late mother, Vivian, who, as a child, saw Houdini’s show in Milwaukee during his final tour, in 1926. Her recollections over the years always filled me with wonder.

  For inspiration, I must thank two friends: Daniel Guenzel, who first introduced me to the Holmes stories, and the late John Bierman, who knew the mystery genre inside and out. For assistance in the writing, itself, thanks goes to Cherie Backus, who offered insights into London, and Carolyn Bobke, who proof-read the manuscript.

  I am grateful to friend and artist, Keith Ward (www.wardillustration.com). His original conceptual sketch for the painted version on the cover of the Second Edition, appears on this, the Third Edition's cover. The cover design was, in turn, conceived by my oldest daughter, Kaitlin Matthias, and then created by myself, Kaitlin, and Craig Knickerbocker.

  For their support during the surprisingly lengthy creation period of this, the "author's cut," heartfelt thanks goes to my wife, Andrea Knickerbocker, and my youngest daughter, Erin Matthias.

  Foreword

  I n the past two dozen years or more, well more than a score of so-called, "lost manuscripts” from the pen of John H. Watson M.D. have appeared. All of them purport to be the genuine article, and describe various and sundry (usually fantastic), reasons for their late emergence into the limelight. Anyone familiar with the original sixty cases can place the latest score into respective rankings of importance and/or authenticity.

  A few of these are obviously tongue-in-cheek. They contain wild distortions, preposterous characters and situations, and their creators parody their source with abandon. Others among this group are poor attempts by their authors to malign the integrity of the original body of work. They recklessly wrench the characters out of their milieu, and exercise their own perverse author’s license, apparently in an attempt to rise above the very material which inspired them. This is nothing less than literary piracy, and deserves no critical scrutiny.

  However, some of the above-mentioned group quite possibly are bona fide reminiscences of Watson’s. They are in spirit with the originals, they fit the form, they possess the wit, and they generally seem "of the time." If they
go astray and exhibit obvious “Americanisms” or even “twentieth (and/or twenty- first )-century-isms” they do it infrequently. There is an argument—not without merit—claiming that the legitimate works contained just as many of these “literary anachronisms,” and would be present, were it not for the editing performed by Dr. Conan Doyle and/or the original publisher. After all, says the argument, language is not the entity some would like to think, such that alien or foreign words or phrases would not creep into the style of an active man in one of the most progressive cities of the world. It is rather an evolving tool, a continua11y changing process which cannot acceptably be defined or described at any one point in time. Too, the one feature these new manuscripts have in common which is rarely if ever noted, is the absence of Dr. Conan Doyle, the Canon’s editor. For these reasons, and others noted before me, one cannot with any certainty, rule out the possibility that one, two, or even most of these “recountings” are not part of the earlier whole.

  It is to this last few that I believe the following account belongs. "The Pandora Plague" is the title given by Watson to the events surrounding the meeting and subsequent early association (and, indeed, alliance), of himself, Sherlock Holmes, and Harry Houdini. What follows is the unaltered narrative of those events. Taken from the sole original handwritten manuscript, this story represents a “pure” Watsonian discourse, before he (or anyone else) corrected things, deleted portions, or changed names or dates. In other words, what follows are the true events, as witnessed and experienced by Watson, himself, unaffected by the usual censoring mechanism, which, as will be seen, would have wreaked inestimable havoc upon them.

  On Halloween day, 1926, Ehrich Weiss, A.K.A. Harry Houdini, died in Detroit, Michigan, of complications arising from being struck several times in the abdomen by a young college student. The man was innocently testing Houdini’s reputed ability to withstand any blow. He struck before Houdini could prepare himself, and within nine days of the injury, the legendary performer was dead. It should be mentioned in the young man's defense, that Houdini stubbornly went on with his rigorous schedule, and refused to be hospitalized until it was too late. Nevertheless, it was a tragic loss, to which, in my opinion, the world of magic has never recovered.

  His last engagement was at the Garrick Theater, on October 24, 1926. On that same day, two parcels, a package and a letter, were received from England. They were never opened. Houdini collapsed after his show, and somehow the two pieces were misplaced and sat on a shelf in an office of the theater for several years. Eventually (sometime in the middle 1930’s), an usher assigned to clean the office, found the two pieces, and rather than forward them to the Houdini family, took them home. Upon reading them, he became too frightened to let them out of his possession, lest he be branded a criminal for withholding documents of such historical importance, and so they remained with him until his death in 1996. Well before then, though, he had left Detroit, and in 1964, he became my neighbor and eventually my friend. As I grew up, I came to know him as a kind of “surrogate” grandfather, and recall passing many a happy hour absorbed in his long and colorful recounts of his life in the theater. Before he died, he took me into his confidence, and passed the materials and their unique history to me. Reading them, I quickly realized their worth, and spent another five years checking and verifying them. I am fully aware of the resemblance of the above to the earlier “fantastic” justifications of the past. Not minding in the least, I do hereby release the two parcels for publication. (Both parcels bear the address of a nursing home in rural Kent.) First, the letter:

  10, October, 1926

  My Dear Houdini

  Holmes sends his regards. He is doing well, though I see him only infrequently of late. How is Beatrice? And Theo? I am in excellent health, and in fine spirits. Every report of your career indicates continued success.

  My purpose, this time, is more than social. After much additional persuasion from me, your request that I be allowed to attempt to put into print the events concerning our first meeting, and the case which resulted, has been granted. Granted, however, only on condition that both Holmes and his brother be allowed to examine and edit it upon completion.

  I anticipate that they will expunge much of it. For that reason, I have written it as truthfully as I could, with the hope that some facts remain out of the sheer weight and volume running throughout the text. I was originally against the idea under such restrictions, but as I took out all my notes on the affair, I soon had the “bug” in me to write one more.

  Too, my life is not so full as it once was. One day begins to seem like any other, and the boredom must be countered. So, I decided to go ahead. As you will see, nothing is changed. Indeed, whole passages from my notes, written during and immediately after the affair are part of the narrative, and remain as written. I cannot imagine how Holmes and his brother plan to change certain features without destroying the incident entirely. However, that is their affair.

  I have a single draft of the manuscript, handwritten, as usual, and I am sending it to you before they. Please read it; delete what you must, if you so desire. When you have made your changes, please return it to me, and I will forward it to Holmes, and so to Doyle--if it still remains. I felt that you deserved to see the “original” before it was altered.

  Finally, please send another of your little tricks. The last delighted everyone in the reading room, and it is such good fun to fool that “knows-all,” Gregson. Besides, the days pass too slowly without some amusement now and again.

  I trust, then, I will hear from you very shortly. And, good luck in Detroit!

  Faithfully, I remain,

  John H. Watson, M.D., ret.

  This letter and the manuscript it accompanied were never seen by Harry Houdini. Nor were they ever traced, later, by Watson. It must be assumed that Watson never inquired as to the whereabouts of his manuscript because of his own situation, and his probable wishes not to disturb Mrs. Houdini in her grief. When he died, some thirteen years later, Watson took with him the sole knowledge of the completed tome’s existence until its discovery by my late neighbor, who, for obvious reasons, shall go nameless. As for my own accessory-ship status, I suppose I am open to prosecution if the relevant statutes are not limited, and living witnesses can be found. Concerning my editorial interference, I have excised nothing. In cases of Watson’s use of “old world” spelling such as “colour,” “sceptical,” “connexion,” and “realisation,” I have merely updated the manuscript to the current fashion. The following, then, is the truth as Watson saw it.

  Lee A. Matthias

  May, 28, 2009

  Note: Editor’s commentary appears as chapter end-notes, referenced by number, in the text.

  1900

  Chapter One

  Mr. Harry Houdini

  I

  I have known Sherlock Holmes for nineteen years. In that time in my capacity as his chronicler and his friend, I have come to realize that he is an extraordinary and unique man. And I use the term, extraordinary, not as a mere superlative, but with all the meaning the word conveys. We all can lay claim to the distinction of being unique, but few can go much beyond. Sherlock Holmes is one of those few. It is fit­ting, therefore, that he met the great American magician and escape-king, Harry Houdini. For he, too, is an extraordinary and unique man. Both of them have that ability to effect and affect great events. Such was the nature of their association. As often as I have set down superlatives and chronicled peculiarities, never have I been party to such an unusual chain of cir­cumstances. Stemming from a meeting of seemingly utter insignificance, and proceeding to a conclusion of all-too-assuredly supreme importance, their affiliation, above all others, merits the word, singular.

  It was in July of the year, 1900, that this narrative begins. Holmes had just finished clearing up the mat­ter of the Conk-Singleton forgery business and was busily at work including into his records a new cipher we had come across during the affair. I was at the breakfast table glancing throug
h the morning newssheet when there came a peal at the bell. Holmes finished the conversation we were heatedly engaged in as the sounds of our caller’s footfalls upon the stairs entered our sitting-room.

  “No, my dear Watson, I still cannot accept this parallel you draw between myself and Herr Nietzsche’s ‘Ubermensch.’ I tend to favor the Wagnerian side of the controversy, even though I must accept the political implications such a tendency carries with it. Ah, Inspector MacDonald. I trust your end of this forgery business has reached its conclusion?”

  Rather than pursue the curious implications referred to by my associate, I passed over them to stand, for we were joined by the person of Inspector Alec MacDonald, of Scotland Yard. In answer to Holmes’s question, the tall policeman nodded in satisfaction.

  “That is so, Mr. Holmes. And glad I am for it. I came by in order that I could thank you for the assistance you gave us.”

  “No need, no need at all. It was especially instructive. I am just now including into my notes that amazing cipher they employed.”

  The Aberdonian’s eyebrows came together in evident puzzlement. “Cipher? I was not aware of any cipher involved with this case.”

  “You would have, had it not been nipped in the bud so early. Step closer and tell me what you can make of this.”

  He did so, and the detective/performer began anew the demonstration to which he treated me on the day he originally broke the code. First, he presented the tall detective with a scrap of paper. (It eventually enabled him to learn the system of communication used by the gang of skilled forgers.) On it was the single word, “GHOTI.” MacDonald scanned it for several seconds, set it down, and considered a moment longer. Holmes watched him expectantly.