John Adams - The Improbable Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

"My own conclusions were profoundly disturbing. The mystery could not be resolved. What we-even Miss Thurston-had witnessed were not merely unlikely, but impossible.

"'I reject the impossible,' said Holmes vehemently, 'as a matter of policy. Such things cannot be-'

"'You and I and the girl saw, Holmes. They are.'

"'No, Watson! No! The irrational has no place in detective work. We must confine ourselves to the tangible and physical, carefully building upon meticulous reason, or else the whole edifice of my life's work crumbles into dust. Against the supernatural, I am helpless, my methods of no use. My methods have been useful in the past, don't you think? And so they shall be in the future, but we must remain within certain bounds, and so preserve them.'"

Again I, the college boy, was left speechless.

"Holmes made me swear an oath-and I swore it-never to write up this case-and I never wrote it-"

Had he, in a sense at least, broken his oath by telling me? I dared not ask. Was there some urgency now, of which had lately become aware?

"I wanted to tell someone," was all he said. "I thought I should."

King Midas. Ass's ears. Who will believe the wind in the reeds?

I merely know that a week after I returned to school in America I received a telegram saying that Dr. Watson had died peacefully of heart failure, sitting in that very chair by the fire. A week later a parcel arrived with a note from one of my aunts, expressing some bewilderment that he had wanted me to have the contents.

It was the idol of the bat-winged dog.

Mary Robinette Kowal is the author of several short stories, including "Evil Robot Monkey," which is a current finalist for the Hugo Award. Her short fiction has appeared in Asimov's, Strange Horizons, Cosmos, and Escape Pod, and in the anthologies Twenty Epics, The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction Vol. 2, and Gardner Dozois's The Year's Best Science Fiction. Her first novel, Shades of Milk and Honey, is forthcoming from Tor Books. Kowal was also the 2008 winner of the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer, and when not writing she works as a professional puppeteer.

Men are notoriously reluctant to get married, and when you look at the history of weddings, who can blame them? After all, weddings are pretty dangerous places. The marriage of Claudius and Gertrude in Hamlet ends in what can only be termed tragedy. Good night, sweet prince. In fact, good night just about everybody. In Monty Python and the Holy Grail, a misinformed Sir Lancelot rampages through a wedding party, slaying many, including the best man. And these are small potatoes compared to truly disastrous affairs such as the Saint Bartholomew's Day Massacre of 1572, in which a controversial Catholic-Protestant marriage touched off a wave of violence that eventually claimed as many as thirty-thousand lives. Is it any wonder that men stay away? It's simple prudence, really. In Conan Doyle's story "The Adventure of the Norwood Builder," Watson mentions in passing the "shocking affair of the Dutch steamship Friesland, which so nearly cost us both our lives." Our next story imagines what this evocatively titled case might have entailed-it involves a naive young woman, a royal couple, a glassblower, and the darker side of Italian politics. And oh yes, also a wedding.

I was born Rosa Carlotta Silvana Grisanti, but in the mid-Eighties, I legally changed my name to Eve. As you have guessed in your letter, after the shocking affair of the Dutch steamship Friesland, my dear friends Dr. Watson and Mr. Sherlock Holmes suggested that my safest course of action would be to distance myself from my family.

But I get ahead of my story; I have not Dr. Watson's gift for explaining Mr. Holmes's methods, and I fear your wish that I relay the particulars of this strange case may be met with inadequate measures.

On the twelfth of October, 1887, I was being taken by the steamship Friesland from our home on the Venetian isle of Murano to Africa; there to meet my betrothed, Hans Boerwinkle, a man several years my senior with whom my father had very recently made arrangements. Living as we do now, in the nineteen-twenties, it is difficult to remember what a sheltered life we girls led forty years ago, but at the time it seemed natural that my brother, Orazio Rinaldo Paride Grisanti, escorted me as chaperone. With us also was my lady's maid, Anita.

In addition to my trousseau, we had several boxes packed with the finest Murano crystal as part of my dowry. My father had blown glass without cessation after my betrothal was announced. I remember Zia Giulia asking, "What is the hurry?" At the time, I was only anxious to be an adult, which was all that marriage meant to me.

I can still recall my excitement at dinner the first evening as glittering ladies and gentlemen, in full evening dress, caught me in a dazzle of delight. Orazio and I were seated at a table with two British gentlemen and a couple from Hungary; at the captain's table sat Signore Agostino Depretis, the premier of Italy, with his new bride, Signora Michela Depretis. As I anticipated my own wedding and honeymoon, I envied the young woman and the way all eyes sought her.

But I should not dwell on my youthful fancies. The two British gentlemen, as you might have surmised, introduced themselves as Mr. Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson.

Mr. Holmes delighted me by having an excellent command of Italian, and asked us endless questions about glassblowing. While we bantered, Signore and Signora Comazzolo, a rival glassblower family, who also sailed on the Friesland, sent a bottle of expensive champagne to the bridal couple.

My brother's eyes narrowed, then laying his hand upon my arm, he said in Italian, "Would you send them a gift as well, though it means parting with a small item from your dowry?"

"Papa will send me more." I smiled at him. "I shall write a note myself."

Orazio gestured to Anita and gave her hurried instructions. In moments she returned with a small box containing a matched pair of opalescent champagne flutes ornamented by delicate tracings of crystal. I quickly penned the note that you have in your possession.

A foolish note, from a foolish girl, but-how was I to know what was to follow? Before the ink was dry, my brother snatched the note and fairly sprinted across the dining room. Bowing at the captain's table, he presented the box of flutes to Premiere Depretis and his bride. She laughed prettily, and kissed him on both cheeks to thank him.

I do not boast when I say the artistry of these flutes was without peer. My father was a brilliant glassblower; no other studio knew the secret of his opalescent glass, and of its shifting colours that bent light into translucent rainbows.

Nothing would do then but for the bridal couple to open the champagne and toast the assembly with these confections of glass. The champagne's bubbles danced as merrily as if they were celebrating with us.

Premiere Depretis said, "Ladies and gentlemen, with this lovely Murano glass I propose a toast to my fellow countrymen and to my beautiful wife. Long life and health to us all."

They drank their champagne and kissed each other with love in their eyes while we looked on, applauding wildly. Signore Comazzolo, perhaps jealous that our flutes had upstaged his champagne, called out. "How is the champagne, Premiere?"

Premiere Depretis bowed to him before burying his nose in his glass to inhale the bouquet of the champagne. "An elegant nose with nuances of honey, gingerbread, parsley and slight hints of garlic." He sipped the champagne again, savouring it. "Minerality, pears and a bright acidity. Delightful."

We applauded again, perhaps even more wildly than before. I sat, breathless with delight, darting glances at the bridal couple over each course. The first course was oysters and my brother ordered a bottle of champagne so that we could celebrate "in the same style as our Premiere and Signora Depretis."