The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes
1927
The final dispatch from the greatest detective who ever lived. This collection gathers the last twelve cases Arthur Conan Doyle committed to paper, tales written with the assured hand of a master who knew he was taking permanent leave of his creation. Here, an aging but undiminished Holmes matches wits with murderers, thieves, and the occasional vampire, each puzzle a perfectly engineered machine of clue and deduction. The adventures include the sinister Baron Gruner, a killer with a face mapped by the Duke of Denver, and the haunting case of the vanished Thor Bridge. Yet beneath the brilliant puzzles lies something quieter: the melancholy of finality. Watson, ever faithful, chronicles it all with the plain devotion that has made him the most beloved sidekick in English literature. These are the stories that closed the book on Baker Street forever, and they remain the gold standard against which every detective since has been measured.
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“You have a grand gift for silence, Watson. It makes you quite invaluable as a companion.””
— Arthur Conan Doyle
“Excellent!" I cried. "Elementary," said he.””
— Arthur Conan Doyle
“I cannot live without brainwork. What else is there to live for? Stand at the window here. Was ever such a dreary, dismal, unprofitable world? See how the yellow fog swirls down the street and drifts across the duncoloured houses. What could be more hopelessly prosaic and material?””
— Arthur Conan Doyle
“Of all ruins, that of a noble mind is the most deplorable.- ””
— Arthur Conan Doyle
“if i could be assured of your destruction, i would in the interest of the public, cheerfully accept my death.””
— Arthur Conan Doyle
“As a rule, the more bizarre a thing is, the less mysterious it proves to be.””
— Arthur Conan Doyle
“I think there are certain crimes which the law cannot touch, and which therefore, to some extent, justify private revenge.””
— Arthur Conan Doyle
“...Holmes, who loathed every form of society with his whole Bohemian soul, remained in our lodgings in Baker Street, buried among his old books, and alternating from week to week between cocaine and ambition, the drowsiness of the drug, and the fierce energy of his own keen nature.””
— Arthur Conan Doyle
“He was, I take it, the most perfect reasoning and observing machine that the world has seen, but as a lover he would have placed himself in a false position. He never spoke of the softer passions, save with a gibe and a sneer. They were admirable things for the observer- excellent for drawing the veil from men's motives and actions. But for the trained observer to admit such intrusions into his own delicate and finely adjusted temperament was to introduce a distracting factor which might throw a doubt upon all his mental results. Grit in a sensitive instrument, or a crack in one of his own high-power lenses, would not be more disturbing than a strong emotion in a nature such as his.””
— Arthur Conan Doyle
