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“Baker Street.” Holmes informed the cabbie curtly. His eyes were distant as he considered the problem before him. As we were dropped before the familiar door of the 221B lodgings Holmes impatiently pushed past me, hurried up the seventeen steps to where his pipes and rough-cut tobacco waited. By the time I had ascended the stairs pungent smoke was already thickening the atmosphere.

For the remainder of the day Holmes smoked his pipes, the great engine of his brain grinding away at the puzzle. As night approached he removed his ash filled pipe, grimaced and exclaimed, “It won’t do Watson, it simply will not do!”

“Perhaps we should return to the asylum,” I suggested. “Interview more of the staff.”

“In case I overlooked something significant!” In another man’s mouth such a statement might sound reasonable. Holmes spat it like a curse. My friend was not accustomed to doubting his own formidable abilities. Holmes shook his head. “No need for that Watson, we still have fresh earth to turn. You recall Miss Drayson mentioned a Mr. Willingham.”

I nodded. “She suggested he would be the next victim but not how we would find him.”

“But she also suggested he might be a close friend of the last victim,” Holmes reminded me. “Mr. Wolfe had a business partner, a Theodore Willingham. An interesting coincidence, isn’t it? I have the address here. We best leave if we are to arrive before nightfall. And Watson—”

“My service revolver,” I finished the thought, already in motion to retrieve the deadly weapon. Holmes allowed himself a small smile as he left to hail a cab.

My old wound ached as we climbed the stairs to Mr. Willingham’s fourth floor lodgings. As I navigated my way upwards it occurred to me that living in the upper reaches of a London residence offered a strange protection. Perhaps Holmes had a formula to calculate the frequency of crimes in proportion to the number of steps between the criminal and his desired felony. At last we stood before the thick oaken door of Mr. Theodore Willingham. I might have hesitated, uncertain as to what welcome we should expect given the improbable tale we carried with us, but Holmes had no such compunction. His determined knock echoed in the cramped confines of the hallway like a series of artillery shots.

The stout door opened fractionally, barely enough to reveal the concerned eye of the occupant. Holmes paused long enough to determine there would be no further introduction unless he initiated it. “My companion and I were hoping to speak to you regarding the unfortunate Mr. Wolfe.”

Curiously, Mr. Willingham’s response to this was to thrust his hand out into the hallway so that Holmes might shake it. The heavy door opened no further. The distrust gleaming in the watching eye did not lessen. Nor did Mr. Willingham offer a single word in way of greeting.

“Of course,” Holmes said, as if the out-thrust hand explained everything. Holmes took the offered hand and shook it briskly and deliberately.

“Thank God,” Willingham welcomed us with a desperate sincerity as he withdrew his hand. Holmes cast a self-satisfied look my way. Bringing a finger to his lips, he warned me to silence. While I did not understand the need for my quiet, I knew Holmes well enough to trust he would explain his odd request when the opportunity presented itself. I nodded as Willingham pulled open the heavy door and hurried us inside.

Our host, Willingham, was a tall man of imposing stature. Haunted eyes in a weather-beaten face looked worriedly up and down the hallway. His wide, dashing moustache and the tuft of beard on his chin put me in mind of an adventurer, like a knight from the tales of chivalry beloved by schoolboys across the Empire. Closer inspection revealed a nervousness, an unshakable fright, such as I had witnessed during my military service. Willingham seemed to me a once dashing figure who was now haunted by his intimacy with the battlefield.

As we stepped into the small apartment I was surprised to see a long sword leaning against the wall beside the doorframe. Should