Martin Greenberg - Sherlock Holmes In America

“That is essentially correct.”

“And how is Dr. Watson?”

“Well. I see little of him since his most recent marriage.”

Finally, I reached the obvious question. “What brought you to America?”

The answer proved frustrating: “A matter too delicate to reveal. Perhaps one day the full story can be told. For now, consider me an ordinary tourist, hoping to see some of this invigorating young city before returning home. I seek no publicity of my presence here, and in fact explicitly discourage it.”

“Do I gather though that you still do some detective work?”

“On rare occasions. A problem with truly singular elements is difficult to resist.”

I immediately offered to be his guide to the city of Chicago, and he readily accepted. In the days to follow, we saw (and smelled) the stockyards, visited the site on De Koven where Kate O’Leary’s cow kicked over a lantern and started the great fire of 1871, viewed such towering architectural masterpieces as the Rookery and the Schiller Building, rode the “L” trains, marveled at the great collections of the Art Institute, attended a concert of the Chicago Orchestra, and sampled the varied cuisines that immigrant populations offer a great city’s diners. On his third morning in the city, I suggested a visit to the site of the World’s Columbian Exposition, Chicago’s 1893 world’s fair, and casually asked if he would consent to meet a friend of mine while we were in the area.

“I am too much in your debt to refuse,” he said, “but I trust I can rely on your friend’s discretion.”

“Absolutely. He’s an interesting chap. Athletics coach. I met him when I was in France seven years ago covering the Olympic Games. A man of unshakable moral principles.”

“They can only be deemed unshakable if they have been put to the test.”

“Oh, his have. He was planning to bring several runners to the Games but cancelled the trip when he learned the finals of all their events would take place on Sunday. Then a cablegram from Paris said the French had decided to change the finals to a weekday, so he made the trip with his athletes after all. But when he got there, he found the original schedule still in place. He withdrew his team from the competition. Americans take the Sabbath seriously, you see. Don’t ask my friend his opinion of the French. But he’s a splendid fellow, really, has played and coached nearly every competitive sport under the sun. At present, he is most renowned for football.”

“Is that Association football or rugby?”

“Neither. American football. Closer to rugby but different. It’s a college game primarily, but some institutions have banned it on grounds of excessive violence, including fatalities. In response, the coaches keep adjusting the rules, whether to save the sport or outfox their fellows, I’m not certain, but it is enormously popular and draws huge crowds.”

Conveniently for my ulterior motive, the former site of the World’s Fair overlapped the campus of the University of Chicago, a highly experimental, daringly coeducational institution established only a few years earlier thanks to a series of gifts by John D. Rockefeller. For all the university’s modernist innovations, its buildings were of a traditional gothic design, combining with the artistically landscaped quadrangles to create an aesthetically stimulating environment for learning.

“That gymnasium resembles a cathedral,” Holmes remarked at one point of our walk across the campus.

“That’s what Rockefeller thought. But in a way it’s appropriate. One of the new ideas that enliven this place is a well-funded Department of Physical Culture and Athletics. It’s given equal status with other academic disciplines and headed by an athletic director with professorial rank. And he, it happens, is the man we are going to see.” As I pointed out to Holmes the buildings and other landmarks, I had been following the most direct route to the office of Amos Alonzo Stagg.

Stagg was a large, powerfully built man in his forties with chiseled features and a steady, penetrating gaze. Though he already had a visitor, he waved us into his office with a broad smile. As he walked around the desk extending his hand, he seemed to be moving somewhat gingerly, but his handshake was firm as ever. His younger companion, slight, pale, and alight with nervous energy, was Perry Garth, a reporter for one of the Chicago dailies. Respecting Holmes’s desire for privacy, I introduced him as Mr. Benson. Shaking hands with Stagg and Garth, he nodded amiably but said nothing.

“Not given up, Perry?” I twitted my colleague.

Garth shrugged. “One can only keep trying.” As always, his manner had a studied nonchalance, as if nothing in the world mattered, but I sensed an undertone of desperation.

Stagg explained, “Mr. Garth would like me to write some articles for his newspaper, and every time he darkens my door, he increases his offer. I have repeated over and over that it’s not a matter of money, but apparently he subscribes to the notion that every man has his price. As the athletic director of the University of Chicago, I must make myself available to all of the city’s daily newspapers equally. It would not be appropriate for me to favor one over the others.”

“Sure, I can understand that,” said Garth. “But with all the scandals and bad publicity visited on your sport in the last few years, I thought you would welcome the chance to defend it against the hordes of bluenoses. My editor agreed, and I sort of went out on a limb promising your cooperation.”

“That’s the danger of going out on a limb without testing its strength first.”

“Maybe. But writing something for us about the character-building you do out on the practice field might be in service of a higher good, don’t you think?”

Stagg smiled. “I hope I always act in service of a higher good, Mr. Garth.” I knew they had rehearsed this argument many times before, and the journalistic grapevine suggested enticing Stagg to write for his paper was crucial to Garth. Some said his job depended on it.

But now Garth shook his head in comic resignation. “Anyway, before I leave, you can at least give me a good quote on the Carlisle game. You’ve already won the Big Ten. You’ve said this year’s team is your best ever. Now you’re up against Pop Warner and his Indians. You’re not going to let a bunch of redskins take your scalp, are you?”

“I saw their game against Minnesota, and they are impressive indeed. Their speed is dazzling. Our men will need to play their very best to beat them.”

“What do you think of Warner as a coach?”

After a moment’s pause, Stagg said, “He’s certainly a fine coach.”

“I’ve been to Carlisle to interview him. Would you like to hear what he says about you?”

“Nothing profane, I hope. Glenn Warner can say what he wants to my face, and I don’t take secondhand reports of anyone’s comments too seriously. Not all journalists are as scrupulously accurate and professional as yourself, Mr. Garth.”

Turning toward Holmes and me, Garth said, “You fellows caught the sarcasm there, didn’t you? Was ever a man so misjudged as this humble scribe? Seriously, I don’t know why I bother. Coach Stagg always says the same thing. Good day, gentlemen!” And with that, Garth was out the door.

Stagg, not fooled for a moment by my subterfuge, said to my companion, “It is an honor to meet you, Mr. Holmes.”

“I congratulate you, Mr. Stagg,” Holmes said. “We’ve never met, and I’ve managed to avoid publicity while in your country. Surely, you could not identify me from the idealized images conveyed by Mr. Steele in the magazines, or Mr. Gillette on the stage. I am innocent of that calabash pipe or that countrified deerstalker with which I am so often depicted. I haven’t uttered a word since I entered your office, so you heard no accent to indicate my nationality. How, pray tell, do you know who I am?” As he spoke, Holmes cast a suspicious glance in my direction, which I returned with a show of injured innocence.