This one was not so much of a case but more likely Holmes had slipped back into the over use of cocaine and other narcotics he picks up the those dens he sometimes frequents down by the docks. It was a very rainy early morning when I had a knock on the door of my room, "Watson, are you awake?" and with continued knocks and exclamations, "Watson, Watson are you awake?"
I opened my door as he almost fell through it trying to knock harder, "Watson you are awake, good. I need to talk to you about something very unusual." Holmes looked drawn and long in the face, his eyes were darkened and sunken into his skull and he said, will you share some tobacco with me, here sit next to the fire and we will talk."
On the few occasions he has done this, by talk he means that he will talk and I will listen to him, it helps him get things straight in his over active head. I sat next to the fire and decided not to call Mrs Hudson for some coffee and I lit a cigarette. I had almost finished smoking before Holmes started to talk.
"Watson, over the last five year I have been consulting, with a gentleman, who has been sat in that very chair that you are on no less than 7 different occasions, he is a very interesting man and has told me some very, very unUusal stories." Holmes stood up and tapped his pipe on the palm of his hand, walked over to the fire and threw the bits of tobacco ash into the fire grate. He put the arm of his pipe into his mouth and puffed air whilst taking a pouch of shag from his pocket, filling the pipe and lighting it he started to wander around the room leaving smoke trails in his wake.
"I am sorry Watson I was a long way from here. This man, THE man with the unUsual mind, lets call him Paul for sake of giving him a name. He first of all came to me five years ago and all he told me was that in four days time I will be engaged in a case that will take me to the Reichenbach falls and everything that entailed in The Adventure of the Final Problem, that you so wonderfully chronicled. Since my return two years ago he has come back to see me 5 more times and we have talked and talked about all manner of things."
I watched as he blew out smoke time after time and enquired, "Holmes you said he has been to see you on no less than 7 occasions but you have only mentioned 6." And Holmes turned to around to face me and he looked to be in deep thought, "Well done Watson, well spotted I will make a you a consulting detective out of you before you know it. He met up with me just before I went to see the Maharajah in Calcutta. He seemed to know that I was going to be there before I knew I was going to be." Holmes walked around a more and his pipe smoke lingered in the air and showed that he was walking in a figure eight around the room. "On the last occasion he told me this, he told me that both you and I are actually fictional characters that are penned by an English man called Arthur Conan Doyle."
I cut Sherlock off in his obvious drug induced state and said, "Fictional, that is obvious rubbish he is feeding you and you seem to have fallen for it. Tell me Sherlock are you feeling OK? You don't seem yourself, have you been down to the docks again?" Holmes replied, "I thought exactly the same thing but he told me there was going to be a knock at the door and I was going to tell Mrs Hudson to show up the person who knocked." I interjected again, "And the knock, who was Mrs Hudson going to show up, this mysterious person is obviously the person who has made you think more about this unusual mans outrageous comments."
"Watson, I met and talked to the man, not the unusual man, but the author, Arthur Conan Doyle. I do think I have finally burst a blood vessel in my head, I met an unusual man 7 times, which as you know is not like me to meet someone more than once unless it is on a case, except of course that buffoon Lestrade. But I talked to him 7 times and then I talked to the man he says is the author and creator of Sherlock Holmes the consulting detective. I talked at length to him for almost two days solid in this room whilst you were up in the Lake District fishing. All of this has been too much for me and I am now thinking of retiring to keep bees on a farm I brought on the Sussex Downs." Watson replied to this revelation, "What about your consulting, what will the police do without your incredible skills."
Holmes then said, "You know my methods Watson, you can carry on where I have left off, besides since the death of Moriarty the cases I have been dealing with are missing sisters, a dowry being claimed by a parent other mundane things I am not being stretched anymore."
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