• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

“I trust not, Holmes,” I said, as Mrs Hudson entered with a tray, which she placed on the table and left. Holmes sniffed the air and said: “Hello, what’s this, Watson?”

“Turkish coffee, Holmes. One of Orman Pasha’s attendants gave it to me as we were leaving Royston Manor. He said that the Pasha asked him to say that it was a better stimulant than many others.”

Holmes smiled to himself as he sipped the coffee. “Excellent, Watson,” he said.

The Enigma of the Warwickshire Vortex

F. Gwynplaine MacIntyre

According to Watson’s accounts, Holmes investigated just three more cases in 1903 – “The Mazarin Stone”, “The Three Gables” and “The Creeping Man”. After the last case he decided to retire. He probably did this on the occasion of his fiftieth birthday. He settled in a small house on the South Downs near Eastbourne and spent his time beekeeping, on which he wrote a treatise, the Practical Handbook of Bee Culture, and bringing together all of his own papers to produce the definitive volume The Whole Art of Detection.

He was very strict about his retirement, refusing to venture back to his old practice. Nonetheless, a mind as active as Holmes’s would never be at rest. He recorded an investigation of his own, “The Lion’s Mane” in 1907, but it is rather surprising that he did not record the culmination of a case that had puzzled him for thirty years. This was the remarkable one of James Phillimore, who stepped back into his house to collect his umbrella and was never seen again. Holmes investigated the case early in his career but had been unable to resolve it. The mercurial interests of F. Gwynplaine MacIntyre have caused him to undertake research into a number of areas, none of which were Holmesian, but a stroke of luck while researching the development of the cinema in New York brought the conclusion of the case to light. Many others have attempted to resolve this enigmatic case but here, at last, is the answer.

Strange Disappearance of Local Businessman

A peculiar and unexplained incident is reported from Leamington. On the Wednesday morning, two bankers of this community made a visit to Number 13a, Tavistock-street, the residence of Mr James Phillimore, age 33, who desired to accompany these gentlemen to their place of business for the purpose of discussing a financial transaction.

Stepping into the street, Mr Phillimore glanced momentarily upwards, and – although the weather has been fair this past fortnight – he remarked to his companions: “It looks like rain. Let me get my umbrella.” Whereupon he stepped back into his own house, closing the front door but leaving it unlocked, whilst his colleagues remained on the doorstep.

A moment later, the two gentlemen over heard Mr Phillimore shouting from within: “Help me! I can’t –” His words were terminated in mid-sentence. Mr Phillimore’s two callers straight away entered the house’s antechamber, where a most peculiar sight awaited them.

The floorboards in the centre of the foyer were scorched, in a pattern forming a circle roughly six feet in diameter: as if some unknown vortex had visited this portion of the room, and no other. Mr Phillimore’s muddy footprints could be clearly seen, in a trail leading directly to the perimeter of this circle. The rear half of a footprint protruded from the outer edge of the circle: the front half of Mr Phillimore’s right foot had evidently entered the circular mystery, yet it left no imprint within.

An umbrella-stand stood unmolested in a corner of the vestibule, well away from the circle. The ferrule of Mr Phillimore’s umbrella, with several inches of the shaft, was found on the floor at the outer edge of the circular enigma. The missing portion of the umbrella – which presumably had accompanied Mr Phillimore into the circular zone – had been neatly sheared off.

Both of the witnesses to this astonishing occurrence are prominent bankers of Leamington Spa, whose veracity and sobriety are above reproach.

The house has now been thoroughly searched by the local