A new collection of cases, based on Dr. John Watson's secret notebooks of the master detective's investigations, features the inimitable Sherlock Holmes in the "Case of the Cardinal's Corpse," "Case of the Aluminum Crutch," "Case of the Upwood Scandal," and "Case of the Vanishing Barque," among others.
In Sherlock Holmes's London, reputations are fragile and scandal can be ruinous. In order to protect the names of the good (and the not-so-good), Dr. Watson comes to the decision that his accounts of some of his friend's most brilliant cases must never see the light of day. Concealing the manuscripts in an old despatch box deep in the vaults of a Charing Cross bank, Dr. Watson preserves the honour of others and in doing so proves himself a true gentleman as well as a good friend. But then a hundred years pass, and the mysteries outlast the memories of those they once could have harmed.
An aluminium crutch betrays the criminal who relies upon it for support ... An Italian Cardinal lies dead in a muddy yard in Spitalfields ... What do a pair of suspiciously successful gamblers have in common with the Transylvanian mind-reader, Count Rakoezi? And how can Holmes and Watson outwit the jewel thief who has the nerve to steal from the King of Scandinavia?
