The Confabulannotated Sherlock Holmes, Chapter 2.11

Featuring Ant-Man denial, property vacancy rates and emotional vagaries

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Previously on my confabulannotations of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes mystery, The Hound of the Baskervilles: Mortimer wrapped up his story of Sir Charles’ Baskerville’s death

And now, the story continues…

BAD AI IMAGE OF: Holmes on the case

Dr. Mortimer refolded his paper¹ and replaced it in his pocket. “Those are the public facts, Mr. Holmes, in connection with the death of Sir Charles Baskerville.”

“I must thank you,” said Sherlock Holmes, “for calling my attention to a case which certainly presents some² features of interest. I had observed some newspaper comment at the time³, but I was exceedingly preoccupied by that little affair of the Vatican cameos, and in my anxiety to oblige the Pope⁴ I lost touch with several interesting English cases. This article, you say, contains all the public facts?”

“It does.”

“Then let me have the private ones.” He leaned back, put his fingertips together, and assumed his most impassive and judicial expression⁵.

“In doing so,” said Dr. Mortimer, who had begun to show signs of some strong emotion⁶, “I am telling that which I have not confided to anyone. My motive for withholding it from the coroner’s inquiry is that a man of science shrinks⁷ from placing himself in the public position of seeming to endorse a popular superstition⁸. I had the further motive that Baskerville Hall, as the paper says, would certainly remain untenanted⁹ if anything were done to increase its already rather grim reputation. For both these reasons I thought that I was justified in telling rather less than I knew, since no practical good could result from it, but with you there is no reason why I should not be perfectly frank¹⁰.

TO BE CONTINUED

The Confabulannotated Sherlock Holmes, Chapter 2.12

1. Mortimer’s prowess in origami remains divisive to this day, with an entire fanfic spin-off series (‘Dr Mortimer’s Enigmatic Adventures in Paper Alchemy’) briefly overwhelming the alt.fiction.holmes forums in the early 1990s.

2. Wonderful negging here from Holmes.

3. This is Holmes-speak for ‘I read the paper’. Who is he trying to impress by talking this way? Probably that starstruck sycophant, Watson.

4. ‘Obliging the Pope’ was a common slang term for masturbation, which suggests the Vatican cameos affair was rather saucier than a modern reader might reasonably expect.

5. Classic Holmes smugness here, perhaps undercut only slightly when you realise the fingertips he’s brought together aren’t the corresponding ones on each hand, but a random mismatching of both left and right that entangled his fingers in arthritic knots.

6. Conan Doyle is infuriatingly vague on the details of the precise emotion that Mortimer is strongly feeling here, although most scholars agree that is it’s either ‘trepidation’ or ‘the need to urinate’.

7. These days, of course, the most famous shrinking man of science is probably Hank ‘Ant-Man’ Pym. This was a character that Stan Lee, to his dying breath, denied having anything whatsoever to do with the Sherlock Holmes canon, and never mind that ‘The Louse of the Baskervilles’ story. (Tales To Astonish #35)

8. Leaving the particular superstition unspoken at this stage would have titillated readers of the era. Especially so, considering the inordinate number of bizarre rituals those same readers would have been forced to endure on a daily basis, most of which seemed to revolve around trying to ward off malevolent spirits while performing everyday tasks (eg fetching water, chopping firewood, obliging the Pope).

9. The hammering home of this plot motivation is why, to this day, The Hound of the Baskervilles is considered one of the great pieces of vacancy rate-inspired literature.

10. ‘There Is No Reason Why I Should Not Be Perfectly Frank’ was also the working title for Sinatra’s signature song, ‘My Way’.