My Dear Watson Read Online Free PDF Page A

Holmes, for once disappointed to see that he had a case on hand. Agreeing in a brief, communicative glance that they would have to deal with this late-night client before gaining any more privacy for themselves, Watson followed Holmes into what he called their “sanctum.”
    The client was a fellow medical man with a peculiar client/patron who was being menaced by what appeared to be Russians, though they were not. Not Russians, and not even sick; they were in fact faking everything to revenge themselves against a paranoid old man. Holmes could see it all from the outset, knew he was being lied to, and dusted his hands of the whole matter, despite the fact that the man’s life was clearly at risk. Half of it was his annoyance at having his time wasted, and half of it was his annoyance at having his time with Watson wasted.
    “Sorry to bring you out on such a fool’s errand, Watson.” Sorry for the both of them he was, but they were headed home at last, and there’s a tricky little turn in the story that lets you know what ultimately happened.
    My Watson writes, “At half past seven next morning, in the first dim glimmer of daylight, I found Holmes standing by my bedside in his dressing-gown.” Imagine finding Holmes there! Not very strange when you understand that he spent the previous night in Watson’s room and henceforward always felt comfortable bursting in whenever he felt like it.
    I don’t have a whole lot of details for what went on in the dark; I must confess I didn’t really delve when Watson told me this part of the story. I love him, I trust him, I know him to be excruciatingly faithful, and I don’t find myself to be jealous, but there are still some things I’d rather not know. Precisely the way Sherlock Holmes makes love is one of those things. May every man who knows the particulars of it take his secrets to the grave.
    What I do know is that Holmes showed a curious lack of forethought in seducing Watson, almost as though he were a stranger to himself and his own inhuman patterns. Watson was inexperienced, but Holmes had been through a series of men (and preferred them that way, one right after another) which only began with his university friend Victor Trevor. From what Watson gleaned over the years (and from what I have in turn gleaned from Watson), it appears that Sherlock Holmes has a habit of swapping between high and low company.
    There was a dry spell after Trevor and until Holmes had finished at university. Then he spent most of his time skulking around laboratories before meeting an advanced surgery student he got on with uproariously for a few weeks—a surgeon in training who was by all reports just as weird as Holmes himself. They used to stay up late in the dissecting room spilling gin into the runnels of the autopsy tables, doing things with one another that could get the both of them expelled, thrown into jail, and condemned to hell.
    After that man took a job outside of the city, Holmes didn’t waste any time missing him. He next took up with a young ship’s hand he met while collecting algae samples from the local harbors. He slipped and scraped his arm badly on some barnacles, and this uncouth fellow stepped up to help him and to tease him for what looked like quite a foolish pursuit. That connection lasted until the man shipped out again.
    For most of his twenties it was a string of men, none of them long-lasting, but always a rather even mix of professional men and rough trade. He didn’t much care for anyone who didn’t somehow work for a living, but what they did was of little consequence to Holmes, so long as it was honest. With respect to age, he was likewise seemingly indifferent, though most who are older than Holmes resent his advanced knowledge.
    What I mean to explain is that Holmes could be capricious about his partners, and it seems perfectly unwise for him to have pursued Watson, knowing that he could not be thrown over like all the others because they now shared