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“Freud contends that we are wont soon to forget a large number of sensations and perceptions from dreams because they are too feeble, without any substantial emotional weight. The weak images of dreams are driven from our thoughts by the stronger images of our waking lives.”

“I remember my dreams no better or worse than the next man.”

“But it seems to me, based on our conversations here, that the images of your past are stronger and more vivid than those of your present circumstances. The celebrated cases in which you took part, the adventures you shared. How could the drab, gray days of your present existence compare?”

John rubbed at his lower lip with a dry, wrinkled fingertip, his expression thoughtful. “So you think it is not dementia which addles my thoughts, but that I forget my present because my past is so vivid in my mind?”

Rhys made a dismissive gesture. “Dementia is merely a name applied to maladies poorly understood. The categories of mental distress understood in the last century — mania, hysteria, melancholia, dementia — are merely overly convenient categories into which large numbers of unrelated conditions might be dumped. More a symptom than a cause.” He closed his notebook and leaned forward, regarding John closely. “I think, Dr. Watson, that you forget because you are too good at remembering.”

Rhys fell silent, waiting for a response.

John was thoughtful. He closed his eyes, his thoughts following a chain of association, memory leading to memory, from this drab and gray present to his more vivid, more adventure-filled past.

“Dr. Watson?” Rhys touched his knee. “Are you drifting again?”

John smiled somewhat sadly, and shook his head, eyes still closed. Opening them, he met Rhys’ gaze. “No, doctor. Merely remembering. Recalling one of those ‘celebrated cases’ you mention, though perhaps not as celebrated as many others. It involved a man who could not forget, and who once experienced a memory so vivid that no other things could be recalled ever after.”

We have spoken about my old friend Sherlock Holmes, John Watson began. It has been some years since I last saw him, and at this late date I have trouble remembering just when. I saw little of Holmes after he retired to Sussex, only the occasional weekend visit. But as hazy as those last visits are in my mind, if I close my eyes I can see as vividly as this morning’s sunlight those days when Victoria still sat upon the throne, and when Holmes and I still shared rooms at No. 221B Baker Street.

The case I’m speaking of came to us in the spring of 1889, some weeks before I met the woman who was to become the second Mrs. Watson, God rest her, when Holmes and I were once again living together in Baker Street. The papers each day were filled with stories regarding the Dockside Dismemberer. He is scarcely remembered today, overshadowed by other killers who live larger in the popular imagination, but at the time the Dismemberer was the name on everyone’s lips.

At first, it had been thought that the Ripper might again be prowling the streets. Holmes and I, of course, knew full well what had become of him. But like the Ripper before him, the Dismemberer seemed to become more vicious, more brutal, with each new killing. By the time Inspector Lestrade reluctantly engaged Holmes’ services in the pursuit of the Dismemberer, there had been three victims found, each more brutally savaged than the last. On the morning in which the man of prodigious memory came into our lives, the papers carried news of yet another, the Dismemberer’s fourth victim.

By that time, we had been on the case for nearly a fortnight, but were no nearer a resolution than we’d been at the beginning. The news of still another victim put Holmes in a foul mood, and I had cause to worry after his health. Holmes was never melancholic except when he had no industry to occupy his thoughts, but to pursue such a gruesome killer for so many days without any measurable success had worn on my friend’s good spirits.

“Blast it!” Holmes was folded in his favorite chair,