I'll Be Holmes for Christmas

by Mark Steyn
Tales for Our Time #20
December 14, 2018

https://www.steynonline.com/9085/ill-be-holmes-for-christmas

A detective, a doctor, a policeman, and a Christmas goose

It's the Christmas season at SteynOnline. As has been traditional round these parts for many years, we have bargains galore among our Steynamite Christmas specials - and as always we will have a full panoply of seasonal programming in the days ahead, including Tales for Our Time, my monthly series of audio adventures that come December turns to more festive fare.

I'm happy to say the first of this year's Yuletide tales - Little Women at Christmas - was well received, at least by Sol, a first-weekend Founding Member and fearless sailor on October's inaugural Steyn Cruise:

What a talent Louisa May Alcott is to create believable children's characters in the space of a few pages. I suppose this is in a way like A Christmas Carol, and probably like some other favorite Christmas stories (including the Gospels') in the anti-framing, one might call it, of what has been left out. The anticipation and expectation being frustrated doesn't serve to frustrate, in these Christmas stories, and instead turns inward to the spirit of Christmas.

To borrow and para- a phrase, it's a wonderful choice.

Thank you, Sol. The second of our Christmas entertainments this year is very different, but we hope also to your tastes. It brings us back to the author who launched this series, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and his most famous creation, last glimpsed round these parts in an unusual detour into Great War espionage. This rather more domestic mystery was first published in Strand Magazine in 1892 and its central character is a familiar Christmas figure, at least to Victorian London. In this first episode of The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle, prefaced by my introduction, Dr Watson calls on Holmes and finds the great man fascinated by an old, worn hat:

'Its owner is unknown. I beg that you will look upon it not as a battered billycock but as an intellectual problem. And, first, as to how it came here. It arrived upon Christmas morning, in company with a good fat goose, which is, I have no doubt, roasting at this moment in front of Peterson's fire. The facts are these: about four o'clock on Christmas morning, Peterson, who, as you know, is a very honest fellow, was returning from some small jollification and was making his way homeward down Tottenham Court Road. In front of him he saw, in the gaslight, a tallish man, walking with a slight stagger, and carrying a white goose slung over his shoulder. As he reached the corner of Goodge Street, a row broke out between this stranger and a little knot of roughs. One of the latter knocked off the man's hat, on which he raised his stick to defend himself and, swinging it over his head, smashed the shop window behind him. Peterson had rushed forward to protect the stranger from his assailants; but the man, shocked at having broken the window, and seeing an official-looking person in uniform rushing towards him, dropped his goose, took to his heels, and vanished amid the labyrinth of small streets which lie at the back of Tottenham Court Road. The roughs had also fled at the appearance of Peterson, so that he was left in possession of the field of battle, and also of the spoils of victory in the shape of this battered hat and a most unimpeachable Christmas goose.'

Maxine Waters could impeach a Christmas goose if the battered hat said "MAGA" on it. But we're reasonably confident that's not what Holmes has in mind. To hear Part One of The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle, prefaced by my own introduction to the story, please click here and log-in.

We launched The Mark Steyn Club last year, and I'm very touched by all those SteynOnline supporters across the globe - from Fargo to Fiji, Vancouver to Vanuatu, Cook County to the Cook Islands - who've signed up to be a part of it. As I said at the time, membership isn't for everyone, but it is a way of ensuring that all our content remains available for everyone - all my columns, audio interviews, video content, all our movie features and songs of the week. None of it's going behind a paywall, because I want it out there in the world, being read and being heard and being viewed, and maybe changing an occasional mind somewhere along the way.

That said, if you've enjoyed our members-only bonus features such as our Steyn Club radio serials and you're looking for a Yuletide present for someone special, I hope you'll consider our limited-time-only Christmas Gift Membership, which this year includes a personalized Christmas card from yours truly along with a handsomely engraved Tales for Our Time sampler. Aside from our monthly audio adventures, The Mark Steyn Club does come with other benefits:

~Exclusive Steyn Store member pricing on over 40 books, mugs, T-shirts, and other products;
~The opportunity to engage in live Clubland Q&A sessions with yours truly;
~Transcript and audio versions of The Mark Steyn Show, SteynPosts, and our other video content;
~My video series of classic poetry;
~Priority booking for the second Mark Steyn Club Cruise (following October's sell-out inaugural cruise);
~Advance booking for my live appearances around the world, including my upcoming tour with Dennis Miller;
~Customized email alerts for new content in your areas of interest;
~and the opportunity to support our print, audio and video ventures as they wing their way around the planet.

To become a member of The Mark Steyn Club, please click here - and don't forget that special Gift Membership. As soon as you join, you'll get access not only to The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle but to all the other audio adventures listed below.

One other benefit to membership is our Comment Club privileges. So, whether you appreciate the subtleties of my reading of this Christmas Tale for Our Time or find it far too elementary, my dear Watson, then feel free to comment away below. And do join us tomorrow for the concluding installment of The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle.

For previous Tales for Our Time, click below:

#1: The Tragedy of the Korosko
by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

#2: The Time Machine
by H G Wells

#3: The Secret Agent
by Joseph Conrad

#4: The Prisoner of Zenda
by Anthony Hope

#5: The Cat That Walked By Himself
by Rudyard Kipling

#6: The Diamond as Big as the Ritz
by F Scott Fitzgerald

#7: The Rubber Check
by F Scott Fitzgerald

#8: A Christmas Carol
by Charles Dickens

#9: Plum Duff
by Mark Steyn

#10: To Build a Fire
by Jack London

#11: The Overcoat
by Nikolai Gogol

#12: The Thirty-Nine Steps
by John Buchan

#13: The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde
by Robert Louis Stevenson

#14: The Man Who Would Be King
by Rudyard Kipling

#15: His Last Bow
by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

#16: Greenmantle
by John Buchan

#17: Metamorphosis
by Franz Kafka

#18: The Scarlet Pimpernel
by Baroness Orczy

#19: Little Women at Christmas
by Louisa May Alcott

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5 Reader Comments

Susan Havey • Dec 17, 2018 at 19:02

Mark – you will never know how much your Tales for Our Time means to me. They are directly responsible for the upswing in the quality of my life. How? Instead of listening to the news when I go to bed at night I now listen to your Tales. I am of an age where it used to be Johnny Carson that put me to sleep! I much rather have you read to me.
I love the stories, the timber of your voice. I learn something new from listening to books that I have never read before and visiting old favorites such as Alcott & Doyle warms my heart.
Please don't stop with the Video Poetry either!
See you in Rochester & Vancouver, which will both be another highlight in my life – being with such wonderful people. Thank you for all that you do.

Mark replies:

Thank you, Susan. Very much appreciated - and look forward to seeing you in Rochester and on the cruise.

Josh • Dec 15, 2018 at 08:53

HOLMES AND THE EMPTY SUIT
"Take a look at it, Doctor, and tell me what you see."
Holmes indicated a large blue suit, well-tailored, hanging from the back of the door. The label indicated it came from one of the better haberdasheries in Washington, DC. Otherwise, I found nothing remarkable.
"The fellow was tall, I see, and well enough off to afford what seems to be a rather nice suit. But beyond that..."
"I said 'see', not 'look', Watson. There are volumes, whole encyclopedias, beyond what you have described."
"Dash it, Holmes, such as?" I was used to his extraordinary powers of observation, but no one likes to be shown up.
"Such as, the fellow who wore this suit was rather unsure of himself, obsequious, a prevaricator, and apt to turn a blind eye to--and look the other way from--evident misdeeds."
"Holmes!" I ejaculated. "How...?"
"Elementary. If you look closely, you'll see errant drapery fabric fragments scattered all over the suit fabric. A man so tall would have very little to fear physically, yet he clearly hid behind drapes on many occasions. I would wager that he was easily intimidated by others, even those shorter and less imposing than himself. The dark stains under the arms would confirm that surmise."
"Obvious enough," I allowed. "But 'obsequious'? And a 'prevaricator'?"
"Did you notice the state of the fabric at the knee, Doctor?"
I bent over and looked. And saw. "Rather thinner!" I exclaimed.
"Indeed. I would say our friend spent rather a lot of time in a submissive or debased posture. And the fabric at the seat?"
Again, I saw. "Thin as well!"
"From squirming, I have no doubt. You remember my little monograph on the telltale signs of lying."
"Well, then, what about the blind eye and looking the other way?"
"The moth hole in the left lapel, dear boy. You may have missed it, but a man who invests in a suit like this one shouldn't have. And note the slight stretching in the right side of the collar. He turned his head a lot, it is safe to say."
"By jove, Holmes, you've written a complete personality profile based on a man's suit alone! Extraordinary!"
He arched his eyebrow. "One more thing, Doctor. I shouldn't be surprised if he owns a pet stoat."
"A stoat? Why would a man keep such a pet as some kind of weasel?"
"For company, Watson. For company, of course."
He seemed very pleased with himself and his joke. But two could play at that game. "A weasel in Washington? That would be like looking for a needle in a stack of needles."
"This weasel stands six-foot-eight if he stands an inch, Watson. I should think that would narrow the search."
We chuckled and lit our cigars.

Sol

Josh • Dec 15, 2018 at 10:52

Well done, my good fellow. You might have a future in this. As I thought after Plum Duff last year, fiction seems, theoretically, to be a persuasive way of ferreting out "higher loyalties".

Brian Buehler • Dec 15, 2018 at 07:11

Sherlock Holmes. A hero of every since before the current standard came to be. I found one quote that I found amusing.

"Life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. We would not dare to conceive the things which are really mere commonplaces of existence. If we could fly out of that window hand in hand, hover over this great city, gently remove the roofs, and and peep in at the queer things which are going on, the strange coincidences, the plannings, the cross-purposes, the wonderful chains of events, working through generations, and leading to the most outre results, it would make all fiction with its conventionalities and foreseen conclusions most stale and unprofitable."
― Arthur Conan Doyle, The Complete Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

Byron Winchell • Dec 14, 2018 at 20:08

I had a memory of a memory that David Bowie had issued "Bowie Bonds" in an early iteration of celebrity bonds. Ha, I naively thought anyone could buy a fractional share like some kind of Bitcoin. Is this anything like the Mark Steyn Club? Perhaps in spirit, at least. Bowie, in 1997, caught a financing wave while it was still possible to make money from music recordings thus securing his bonds.

The wikipedia treatment:

"Bowie Bonds"

Bowie Bonds, an early example of celebrity bonds, were asset-backed securities of current and future revenues of the 25 albums (287 songs) that Bowie recorded before 1990. Bowie Bonds were pioneered by rock and roll investment banker David Pullman. Issued in 1997, the bonds were bought for US$55 million by the Prudential Insurance Company of America.The bonds paid an interest rate of 7.9% and had an average life of ten years, a higher rate of return than a 10-year Treasury note (at the time, 6.37%). Royalties from the 25 albums generated the cash flow that secured the bonds' interest payments. Prudential also received guarantees from Bowie's label, EMI Records, which had recently signed a $30m deal with Bowie. By forfeiting ten years worth of royalties, Bowie received a payment of US$55 million up front. Bowie used this income to buy songs owned by his former manager.