The Adventure of the Familiar House.

The manuscript for The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb had barely been placed on paper when once more I found myself in a Hansen on my way to Baker Street. The telegram that had met me that morning at breakfast made mention of "unfinished business" and such was my intrigue that I left the arrangements for postponing that day's appointments in the hands of my trusted wife, dressed hurriedly and flagged down the first carriage that I could find.

Come my arrival at his rooms I was shown in and escorted up the stairs to the sitting room, whereupon I found him once more sucking at his morning pipe and wearing his dressing gown. He stood by the mantlepiece in thoughtful repose, pondering some great mystery no doubt, and such was his gravitas that I completely omitted to notice the gentleman sat in the chair reserved for those who called upon him for assistance.

"Ah, my dear Watson," said Holmes in a manner that suggested great excitement. "May I ask that you deduce what you might about this fellow?"

I looked at the stranger, feeling a little uncomfortable at how he had been reduced to some spectacle in a game. Whether he too was ill at ease was impossible to determine as he sat quietly in the chair with the faintest of smiles upon his thin lips. Indeed his entire expression was impassive and hard to penetrate, his eyes narrow and with thick brows above, his forehead high and marked by the passage of some years and topped with silver grey hair that exhibited a tightening of curl. His dress was entirely of black, from the shoes on his feet to the formal trousers and long coat that was worn over a shirt with the top button undone in a most common manner and which made his long, thin neck seem even more so. He sat with his elbows rested on the arms of the chair and his fingertips pressed together in a manner that suggested he was inspecting me in some way.

"You must forgive my friend, sir," I said to him politely, "he often plays such games with clients old and new."

"It doesn't matter to me," he said in a thick voice from north of the border. "Please, tell me what you see."

His willingness to participate was a little unnerving and perhaps swayed my perception of the gentleman.

"Sir, I deduce you have some money as you attire is somewhat new and unworn. I would deduce further that your money comes from ownership of businesses or investments as you do not dress in a manner that suggests you deal with people on a daily basis. You clearly came here by Hansen as your shoes are immaculate and not in the least affected by the rain we had this morning. Your accent is from Glasgow or Sterling, I presume, which suggests you have trained down overnight, by sleeper carriage if I am not mistaken, as you show no signs of being tired or dishevelled from a night in the lower classes."

Holmes laughed, the client doing no more than smile a little wider and glance at him from the corner of his eyes.

"Watson, yet again you look but do not see."

"And what would you say, Mister Holmes?" asked the client.

The fact that the question had been asked appeared to unsettle my friend, who was not used to such a challenge.

"Sir," he began, "I simply deduce you are a detective from a police force outside of London. There is a fleck of blue paint upon your sleeve, the colour of which matches that in common usage by the constabulary. Your attire suggests a newly appointment member of the detective cadre and given your accent and the correct deduction from Doctor Watson that you have not been in the rain I would suggest you arrived at Euston on the eight-twenty and caught a Hansen here immediately. I therefore deduce you have come to ask for my assistance in the case of the Fourth Ripper."

The client did not move in any way.

"Well, it is true that I didn't walk here," he said slowly. "The other details I think it best we brush over."

He placed his hand inside his jacket and removed a small leather wallet that he showed to Holmes. Immediately my friend's persona changed to one of surprise, not something that I have oft seen on him before.

"Sir?"

"Yes," said the client. "You may call me 'The Doctor' and yes, that is who I represent."

He rose swiftly to his feet, almost leaping with the speed and energy that the movement conveyed. He placed his hands upon Holmes's shoulders and gently steered him to the chair where he had been sitting. Slowly Holmes sat down.

"Now," this 'Doctor' began, "a few nights ago a rather interesting chap called Hatherley appeared at Doctor Watson's home with a severed thumb and a very interesting tale to tell. As I understand it you believe he was commissioned to repair a hydraulic press that was being used to mint counterfeit coins. Is that correct?"

"Well, yes, sir," said Holmes, slowly recovering his composure.

"No, 'Doctor' will do fine."

"But sir," I protested, "how can you know such things. I only finished typing the manuscript of this adventure of ours last night!"

"And very good it is too," said The Doctor, addressing me as one might address a child who had done well at some class. "But that isn't important. What is important is you take me to the scene of the crime."

"Eyford?"

"Exactly!"

"Now, sir?"

"Yes," said The Doctor. "If we're quick we'll catch the nine-thirty from Paddington!"

Holmes looked at him with surprise.

"Doctor, there isn't a nine-thirty from Paddington that goes to Eyford."

The Doctor looked a little crestfallen.

"I know," he said, "but I always wanted to say that."

As we travelled by train into the Berkshire countryside our new client asked us many details of what had occurred that night. On the assumption that you are not familiar with the adventure I shall recount these details for you thusly:

An engineer by the name of Hatherley had received a secretive commission from a German by the name of Colonel Lysander Stark to perform some work upon a machine in the village of Eyford. Being of somewhat financially unsound position, Hatherley had ignored his niggling fears and instead undertaken to accept the commission and had found himself in a blacked out carriage journeying the lanes of Berkshire. A series of misadventures then befell him that saw him lose his thumb in a press, be chased around a building that was eventually to catch fire and finally be left abandoned by the railway station with a bloody digit and no idea how he came to be there. Somehow he managed to make his way to London whereupon he was assisted by a kindly railwayman who conveyed him to me and then into the care of Holmes. By various means Holmes had not only deduced that Hatherley was not the first engineer to encounter the rogues, he had also been able to locate the counterfeiters' press by deducing the carriage that had conveyed him to the house had simply journeyed out and back some distance to mislead its occupant as to where he was headed.

By the time we arrived at the station The Doctor appeared satisfied by both our accounts of that evening and had drawn from us more detail than I had thought appropriate to put to paper. Not least of this was the observation from a consulting engineer attached to Scotland Yard that the hydraulic press that was wrecked in the fire was of a design more advanced than seen before. It was an observation that The Doctor found particularly exciting.

Upon our arrival at Eyford we gathered our bearings and Holmes lead us in the direction of the now ruined house. In spite of what I considered to be his more advanced years, it was The Doctor who led the way, often pausing to look back and encourage us to move faster. The impression of a school teacher returned to me and stubbornly refused to leave.

The last time I'd seen the house from which Hatherley had escaped it had still been smouldering from the great fire that he had inadvertently caused. At that time there had been a suggestion of drama as black smoke had risen from burnt wood, the smell of fire was still in the air and the efforts of the local fire brigade to damp the ruin down had created a scene that was compelling to watch. Now, however, the ruin was silent. The pile of crumbled masonry and shadows of walls and windows simply hinted at what had once been a house and a man's prison. There was no suggestion of the hydraulic press, nor of the dastardly German and his associates who had, the police alleged, been printing forged coins on an almost industrial scale. Indeed, had I not known what had happened here that night I would simply have discounted this as another property that had been reduce to rubble by some unfortunate accident or careless act on the part of the owners.

Ignoring a sign that implored trespassers to keep out for fear of danger, The Doctor strode up to what would have been the front door. He had removed from some pocket inside his coat a device not unlike a large fountain pen that he held toward the ruin. From its tip it seemed to emit a greenish glow that was accompanied by an unfamiliar sound that was quite disturbing to the ear. He moved this pen-device left and right, apparently using it to inspect the ruin for a few moments before holding it upright in front of him and reading some information that was unseen to me.

"Interesting," he said to no one.

"So, Doctor," said Holmes, "from this ruin what do you deduce?"

"First impressions, eh?" laughed The Doctor with a certain fondness that I found unusual. "Well, there was a fire."

Holmes laughed.

"Indeed. And that device tells you that?"

"No, the burnt wooden things tells me that," The Doctor replied somewhat dismissively. "But as we both know, Holmes, there are fires and then there are fires. And this, I think, was the latter."

The Doctor stepped up to the gap in the wall where the front entrance would have been. It was a wide gap suggesting some grand door had been in place, although whatever that had been was now absent. Again our companion removed his device and this time moved it around as if tracing the outline of where the door frame had once been.

"Interesting," he said once more.

"You are referring to the manner in which the door appears to have been relieved of its hinges, no doubt," said Holmes. "Quite clearly they have been wrenched from the wooden frame, which you can see from the remnants that survived, suggesting the door was in some way accelerated away from the building, perhaps by an explosion."

"And what an unusual explosion," said The Doctor as if to himself.

"Sir?"

"Now let's see what's inside, shall we?"

"We should be cautious," I warned. "There may still be areas that had retained their heat or where masonry may still fall."

"My dear friend Doctor Watson, I fear you worry too much."

We stepped inside the ruin, The Doctor leading the way with his pen-device held out and Holmes following. The layout of the house, or at least the lower floor, quickly became apparent to me as I stepped through doorways into what once would have been hallways and rooms, and glanced across at shapes that suggested windows. Here and there I caught suggestions of furniture or patterns that may have been wall coverings. I even found a scrap of carpet that had survived the flames and the firemen's efforts to extinguish them.

"Doesn't this strike you as a bit odd?" said The Doctor.

"Odd, sir?" I asked.

"Well, in your account you said there was a hydraulic press here large enough for a man to crawl inside, only I can't see where they'd put it. It isn't like there's some great room where it could fit all nice and snug."

Holmes appeared a little taken aback.

"An interesting observation, Doctor. Do you not think that perhaps they used an existing room and simply removed the interconnecting ceiling and floor to create the space? That would be the most rational conclusion."

"Perhaps," replied The Doctor, "but then you have the other problem."

"Other problem?"

"A hydraulic press isn't exactly small. It was large enough for your friendly engineer to crawl inside, which would have meant it would have had pretty thick walls, and that's a lot of metal. So where is it?"

"It would have melted, sir!" I scoffed, "There was a fire here, or have you not noticed that while you've looked upon your pen-device?"

"No, Watson, I fear The Doctor has a point. The cylinder in which the engineer crawled would have been of some considerable size and I doubt very much that a simple house fire would have been sufficient to reduce the entire structure to molten metal."

"Which would lead you to conclude what, Holmes?" asked The Doctor.

"That we were mislead!" he ejaculated. "Oh, Watson what a fool I have been!"

"Well, that wasn't what I was thinking, but I guess that is one possible answer," said The Doctor.

"No, sir, you are correct," continued Holmes. "There are details in his tale that do not ring true and to which I was blind."

"I wouldn't be too hard on yourself, Holmes."

"No, Doctor, I should have seen through the deception. By definition a hydraulic press would require vast quantities of water, yet there does not appear to be any facility by which it can be drawn."

The Doctor turned away from Holmes and towards me. He looked at me in a way that was discomforting, staring straight at my eyes and adopting an attitude that was almost aggressive in its nature.

"Yes," he said, "why didn't you see it?"

"I don't know what you mean, Doctor," I replied.

"Well, such obvious details were omitted and yet you wanted us to believe Holmes had solved the case. Now why is that?"

"Now Doctor, I do not understand why you would question me so."

"Yes, Doctor," added Holmes in my defence. "I do not understand the purpose of your questioning."

"Why would you need to mislead your readers? Why would you need to omit such important details?"

I felt as if I was being interrogated and began to back away. In my chest my heart started to race and anger began to swell inside me. It wasn't, I realised, directed at The Doctor though, but rather at my own foolishness. There was something missing, some detail that I had been unable to include in my tale, only no matter how hard I tried to recollect it that detail remained hidden from me.

"You can feel it, can't you?" The Doctor pressed, only now he did not seem to be speaking to me, but rather to some unseen audience that had gathered around us. "You can feel it trying to break out in to your conscious mind. Come on, Arthur, what is it you saw that day?"

The effort of trying to remember became so difficult that I passed out.

When I awoke the first that I saw was The Doctor's face large and smiling, filling my vision. I focused on him, using him as a means to gather my wits before attempting to rise.

"What? What happened?" I asked him.

"Just the usual after effects of a psychic link," he muttered, then backed away from me.

I lifted myself up off my favourite chair and moved cautiously to the cabinet beneath the picture of my beloved Edinburgh. I decanted an appropriate quantity of brandy, to which I added a modest amount of water, then took a few sips to calm myself and recover my composure.

"Doctor," I said, "what has become of me?"

"Nothing much," he said in a reassuring tone, "just that you've encountered something someone else would rather we didn't see."

I considered his statement for a moment before drawing my conclusion and asking, "The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb is true?"

"Do you recall what inspired you to write that particular story?" he asked.

I returned to my seat, exhausted by the effort of movement, and placed the brandy beside me having first downed some more of the refreshing drink. My mind was clearer now and I was finding it far easier to bring events to mind. Clearly whatever malady had caused the faint and subsequent dream, if I might call it that and not an hallucination, had passed me by.

"A patient was brought to me urgently after he had severed his thumb in some machinery, though nothing as sinister as in the adventure," I told him. As I spoke he looked at me with the most intense interest. "Then there was the house that had been damaged beyond repair by fire that I came across whilst on a walk somewhere. The two came together in my mind as the tale that you seem to know so well and yet which The Strand is yet to publish."

"Now I know you went into the ruin, but do you?" asked The Doctor.

My memory drew a blank on the subject, although I was left with an impression that I may have done. When I told The Doctor this he stepped forward to examine me as I might one of my own patients, his pen-device's glow quite blinding and its strange noise almost deafening. Whatever his inspection revealed to that machine of his was clearly satisfactory.

"Sir, how do you know I went in when I cannot recall this myself?"

"Quite simple really. There was so much detail in the adventure that you could only have gathered that from having been there. Unfortunately someone has blocked out details to you, which is why the interior of the house didn't fit with the story. All they've done is replaced what you really saw with some random house that you remember. It might even be this one."

My confusion about his explanation appeared at odds to the clarity and reasonableness with which he delivered his answer.

"But sir," I protested, believing I had found a weakness in his argument, "in the tale Holmes and Watson did not visit the house and what description I offered of it would not be sufficient for you to deduce this."

"Think of the detail," The Doctor countered. "Even in the rubble you could make out the layout of the rooms and there were details like the hinges, the wall paper and carpets."

"That was in my dream, sir. How could you have known such things? More importantly, how could you have been in it?"

The Doctor ignored my question and paced back and forth from fire to side cabinet, his head down and his fingers pressed together and held at his mouth. He appeared to be determined to uncover some mystery whose details remained hidden from me. All the deductive powers that I had gifted to my creation appeared to leave me as I was left little more than a child pondering a clue on a crossword that would be simple to an adult of some education.

"Sir, I do not understand what you are saying. You have implied some knowledge of a dream that I had barely a few minutes ago and you appear to be claiming The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb is based upon fact when I can assure it that it is no more than fanciful writing from my own imagination."

He sprung toward me with a great energy, startling me. His hands wrested on the arms of my chair and he leant forward so that his face was quite close to my own and I could feel the breath from his speech.

"Something happened to you, Arthur. You saw something that you weren't meant to and for that a part of your memory was changed. Only whoever did it didn't realise the mind they were tampering with was that of a literary genius and it left traces. Anyone else would've just thought it was one of those things, but not you, Arthur Conan Doyle. Oh no, not the creator of Sherlock Holmes, the greatest detective who ever lived. Your subconscious could feel someone had been playing around in there and it did what it does best: give you a story. So you sat and you wrote and you imagined and you used this patient of yours as the conduit to try and make sense of it all. You wove the house that you couldn't quite remember into the tale, making it a character, someone who stood there in the front of the scene asking to be recognised and explained, only you never quite could. So you used Hatherley to tell the story, using him to leave the clues that led me here to discover what you really saw."

The words that he said rang true.

"Tell me, Arthur, in early drafts did Holmes and Watson inspect the ruin?"

"They did," I answered.

"And you removed these paragraphs because?"

"They didn't seem to fit into the story. They seemed unnatural somehow."

"Exactly," he said. "Your subconscious couldn't accept you'd been in the house, so the detail of what you saw was reduced to a couple of throwaway lines."

What he said, fantastic as it may sound when the words are placed on paper, was entirely reasonable. I accepted it without reservation.

The closeness of his face to mine gave way from him conveying information to seeking it from me. His inspection of my eyes became more intense.

"Normally I wouldn't do this twice, but on this occasion I may make an exception," he said.

"Doctor?"

He placed his fingertips upon my forehead, making small adjustments until he was satisfied. His thin lips twisted into a smile.

"Here we go again," he said.

How I was transported from my comfortable living room to the gravel drive outside the house was not clear to me. My conscious mind knew that this was no more than a projection that had returned me to the place of my dream. Beside me was The Doctor and together we looked upon the ruinous house that I now seemed to know so well.

"Where are we?" I felt compelled to ask, a question he did not feel compelled to answer.

"Such beautiful detail," he said. "Do you dream of this place often?"

"Sometimes."

"And always you start here?"

"Yes."

"Never the Eyford railway station? Or some other place?"

I considered his question before answering, "No. Never as it happens."

"Now, Doyle, tell me what you see."

I looked upon the familiar seen and narrated what I saw. I told him of the ruins, the rose-bushes where Hatherley had fallen unconscious, the outbuildings where nickel and tin had been discovered. When he pressed me for more detail I described the white paint flaking from the crumbling walls and the burnt and charred wooden frames that had once been windows and doors. When I was required to count the number of stones in the step before the main entrance he still did not appear satisfied with my answers.

"Yet again, Doyle, you look but you do not see. Now tell me what you see!"

My eyes cast around, trying to detect some detail that I had missed. There was nothing that I had not looked upon a thousand times.

"What's behind the house?"

A strange question I thought given the countryside location. As I looked up, however, I could not see the green fields or tended farm fields that I had expected. Indeed it was impossible for me to draw any conclusions as each time I attempted to focus on that background scene my eyes were drawn back to the ruin. What I had was an impression of a scene beyond without being able to see it.

"Good heavens, Doctor, is such a thing possible?"

"Certainly."

He stepped forward and just as he had done in my dream of Holmes and Watson bent down to inspect the cavity where the main entrance had been. I joined him and together we looked across every inch of that burnt wood and its twisted hinges.

"So where is the door?" he asked and rose to his feet.

It took barely a moment to find as it was resting on some shrub behind us.

"You see, this is very curious, isn't it, Doyle. Or should I call you Doctor Doyle?"

"Doyle is fine, Doctor, or there will be some confusion in my mind as to when you address yourself or I."

"Good point, Doyle, good point," he said somewhat excitedly and bounded to where the door lay. Again he knelt and once more passed his keen eye across its charred surface. I wondered if he had the strange device of my previous dream and why he did not employ it at this juncture.

"What do you see?"

"It is odd, Doctor, that the door is here. Would not a door normally open inwards and thus I would deduce that some force had expelled it from the frame and deposited it thus."

"Exactly!" he exclaimed with some excitement.

He returned to the crumbling walls, inspecting a cavity that had once been a window. Our combined inspection revealed a similar conclusion.

"A blast from within the building appears to have occurred."

"Indeed, Doyle. Indeed. That is what appears to have happened. I mean, doors don't just wander off on their own accord and deposit themselves in random plants, do they!"

I found his childish tone somewhat irksome from a man of learning, though I held such thoughts to myself.

"Let's go inside."

Our return to the interior of the property yielded no more than I expected. The details of the floor and wall coverings that had escaped the fire and the fire-brigade's subsequent attempts to quell the flames were as clear to me as always, while the layout was as I recalled and had worked into my narrative. We moved from room to room, pausing in each to make a small inspection until we had covered all.

Then, as we stood in what had been the entrance hall, The Doctor pointed at a corner and said to me, "Describe what you see there."

My eyes followed his finger towards the join of the walls as he had requested. Only as I thought I was looking at it I realised my gaze had not yet left the end of his finger. I tried again, once more discovering it impossible to look beyond his extended digit. It reminded me of the effect that I had experienced outside, although attempting it in this confined space made me far more aware of an aching behind my eyes that betrayed the considerable effort I was making to attempt this otherwise simple task.

"Doctor, I do believe I cannot," I told him.

In a sudden move that made me recoil in shock he placed his hands firmly upon my cheeks and held my head straight so that he could look into my eyes. He inspected each in rapid turn, apparently seeking some malady that had prevented me from completing his request. If I had found nothing I might have considered it a source of frustration and demanded further investigation. He appeared satisfied.

"So what had we learnt, Doyle?" he asked me and released my head.

"We know there is a force here that prevents me from using my sight as God had intended and that an explosion occurred that was strong enough to force a door from its hinges."

"That's more effect, Doyle. I'm more interested in cause. Specifically I would like to know who or what finds this place so important that they have to hide it from you. What did you see when you came here?"

"I know not, sir. I am not convinced that here is somewhere real."

"A rhetorical question, Doyle, and one I know you cannot answer. Now, what have we here?"

By the rear of the hallway was a perfectly preserved door. It stood defiantly amongst the rubble, surrounded on both sides by walls that were damaged by fire. I confessed to not having seen it before, which pleased The Doctor no end.

"How interesting," he said.

Together we went towards it, only to find that each step we took brought it no closer. He asked me to remain where I was then attempted to approach it alone. This did not work. Nor did walking away from it, which only amplified that impression of being unable to leave the entrance hall to a point of frustration. At least it was frustrating for I as The Doctor seemed amused.

"What is it man!" I shouted at him, finally unable to contain my annoyance. I regretted my anger immediately.

"It's a door," he said and laughed.

"But what is it for and why does it refuse to allow us to approach?"

"That's a good question."

"Do you have an answer?"

"Several. One of them involves a pan dimensional wormhole embedded within the cerebral cortex, but the more likely is that this is your subconscious constructing a metaphor that's offering us a way out. Or a way in. Sometimes the two things are so hard to tell apart."

"This does little for us, Doctor. I fear we are now trapped within this house."

"No! This is just a dream, or at least a construct in your subconscious that I've tapped into. All I have to do is wake you up and we're back in 222B Baker Street or wherever it is you live. Speaking of which, where was that? I like the fireplace. Very stylish. I might borrow it."

"Doctor, may we concentrate on the matter at hand."

"Yes. Yes of course. Doors and metaphors."

He turned to the door once more and reached out. Whatever magic he possessed had released the door's grip on us and he took a firm hold of the round brass knob that offered a way inside. As he turned the knob he looked at me and smiled.

"Red pill or blue pill?"

"Sir?"

"Sorry. That's a bit later."

It was early on a cold December morning when I found myself hurrying back towards my lodgings. There had been a fresh fall of snow that had covered the pavements with virgin white and through which I was now making my way. The crunch of my shoes upon the icy cold surface brought up memories of childhood games which warmed me. It also reassured me that I was the only one about.

I had found myself on the streets at such a wretched hour on account of a gentleman who worked at the nearby railway station. I had cured some illness from which he had suffered for several months and ever since had brought a steady supply of patients my way. Although it is not my custom to make visits so late at night, when he arrived at my doorstep with such fear on his face I could not help but follow. A young child had been found beaten and I had done what I could to relieve their pain and test for broken bones and more serious injuries. The police had detained me for a little so as to receive from me what details they could. They were not as interested in my theory as to how the child came to receive such injuries as they might have been, determined as they were to simply arrest the child's father when it was clear the injuries came from much smaller and probably female hands. Nevertheless, I had the familiar feeling of elation from a job done well as I returned through the gaslit streets.

As I rounded a corner barely three streets from my own something made me pause and look up. The cloud had largely cleared from the sky, leaving the stars clearly visible. As I gazed upwards I saw the brief flash of a shooting star and in a moment of superstitious nonsense made a wish that the child would heal quickly and escape his abusive mother.

The brief flash was not the end of the matter. I came to realise the star was continuing on its track, and that the track was heading towards me. Although my brain screamed at me to run, fear held me to the spot and I could do no more than look up and watch as the inevitability of my demise came toward me at great speed.

My fear was unjustified, however, as the star seemed to adjust its course and slow somewhat. Instead of colliding with me, as I had feared, it instead dove almost straight down into the top of a house in the terrace that lined the street, penetrating the tiled roof with almost deafening sound that I felt sure would awaken all.

Fear left me, although the adrenalin did not. I ran along the pavement, my legs moving faster than I remembered them capable of. Around me people started to stir, some looking out of their windows, others pausing to turn on their lights. Such things did not matter to me as I could see the flickering light of flames in the downstairs windows and knew the damaged house was alight.

I bounded up the steps to the front entrance and hammered on the door. Although I was breathing hard from my charge I was able to call "Fire" in an attempt to alert those inside. I feared they were trapped for the staircase would surely have fallen in.

Hearing no movement or response to my calls I heaved at the door with my shoulder. The woodwork was of good quality and held fast against me until, on the fourth attempt, there was a cracking sound as wood splintered and I found myself on the floor of their hallway.

I pulled myself to my feet and crouched down. Flames licked along the walls and ceiling, the fire having already taken hold. I could see rubble and debris scattered about the place, remains from where the object had crashed down from the sky and through the heart of the building. Only that was not all I could see. Before me, hovering above the carpeted floor at a height of two or three feet, was an orb of bright light. It was barely the size of an apple, though perfectly spherical and with a surface that appeared to be wrapped in flame. Once I gazed upon this unearthly thing I found myself unable to stop for it seemed to have me in some trance. And though it had no eyes or features of any kind I knew it was looking back at me.

"What are you?" I asked it.

Time itself appeared to slow. The dance of the flames slowed to a gentle waltz and the sounds of people shouting from outside became no more than a low hum. My eyes were fixed firmly on the strange light hovering before me.

It was speaking to me.

I do not know what words it said, only that they conveyed a feeling of wellness and calm. I was not to be afraid. It meant me no harm, nor those who rushed to my aid. It had chosen this building in this street because it knew it was abandoned and there was no one in it but the orb and I. Most of all it asked me to trust it and, if I could, to forgive it for what must be done.

With that I was expelled from the house with such force that my breath was knocked from me. I landed on the floor and slid along the snow a few feet, my head connecting with the roadway and a mild concussion coming over me. For a few moments I lay upon the cold snow and recovered, looking up at faces looking down.

"Are you all right, sir?" asked one of the faces.

I did not answer as I was somewhat dazed and confused by my fall.

"That was quite a tumble you took," said another, who transformed into a man who helped me to my feet. "Must be the fresh snow."

I looked around at the dozen or so people who had rushed to my aid and wondered what had brought them out of their warm homes at such a frightful hour.

"Indeed," I said, my daze passing now.

"And out so early, sir," said the first face.

"I was tending to," I started to say, then became confused. I looked round at the houses, the perfect terraced houses in their beautiful snow covered scene. "I was tending to a child who was ill. I must have fallen on the snow. I'm a Doctor."

"Then this must be yours," said another face, handing me a black leather bag. "You should be more careful with it. I found it back there by the street corner."

"Thank you. Thank you all for your kind attention. I believe I can return to my lodgings unaided now."

And so I returned to my home with my mind full of confusion and questions about events that had not happened.

We looked upon the row of terraced houses where I had fallen that night. There was no evidence of the damage that I had witnessed, indeed all of the houses appeared as new. Perhaps this should not have been a surprise given their location in a more affluent area and their construction had been less than two decades before.

"Doctor," I said, "I have walked past these houses time and time again and still I do not understand how it could have been repaired so thoroughly and so quickly if what I saw was not simply a dream. Nor do I understand how those around could not have seen it either."

The Doctor looked at the buildings, his head moving from left to right and then back again.

"It's very clever," he said. "The perfect place to hide really, in plain sight I mean. Must be consuming a lot of power though to maintain the field."

"The field? What are you talking about, Doctor?"

He walked towards one of the houses in a deliberate manner. I saw him take from his pocket the same pen-like device with which he had inspected me and hold it up, the buzzing sound emanating from within. He made a sweeping gesture then held it up as if to read from its side.

"Perception field," he said aloud.

"What is that, sir?" I asked.

"It messes with your mind, Doyle," he said. "Makes you see things that are not there so you cannot see what is."

The device emitted a different sound. Before me the scene shifted as if a fog were clearing and revealing details that had previously been hidden. No longer was the terrace a pristine row of housing, but was now exposed to have a ruined member towards one end. This house was missing its front door, while the windows on the ground and first floor were shattered. The white paint that adorned the front of the terrace was blackened from fire and the roof was partially collapsed.

"I do not understand," I said weakly. "What is this?"

"Like I said, it shows you what you want to see."

Still I was not sure I understood.

"It's like a magic trick with mirrors," he told me with a patronising tone.

"Do not mock me," I snapped at him. "I am not some child."

Immediately I felt regret at having offended him so. It did not seem to matter to him though as he simply walked past me and climbed the brief steps towards the entrance. I felt compelled to follow.

The entrance hall was familiar to me from the dream within the dream and I recognised too details that I had imagined as I crafted The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb. Around me was blackened and charred wood from the forgotten fire, thick black also covering the ceiling and walls where the flames had first taken hold. On the floor before us was the door that I had forced from its hinges.

"That's what was wrong in the false memory," said The Doctor. "Front doors normally open inwards, so why was the door jam and hinges configured to open it outwards? A small detail that plagued you, Doyle."

Indeed it was the case. When I closed my eyes I could see the door jam so clearly, with The Doctor kneeling by it and showing me the hinges. Further inspection of that memory revealed the shape of the frame was also wrong as it was far too ornate to face outward.

"When it created the false memories it didn't have much time, so it took a few shortcuts," The Doctor told me. "It replayed details, only it didn't realise they would work against it. Given more time perhaps it would have done a better job and those doubts of yours wouldn't have made it into the story."

His pen-device made its noise again and he waved it across the floor until something unseen to me drew his attention.

"Harmless, really," he said.

"What is, Doctor?"

His gesture directed me down to the floor directly beneath where my tortured memory recalled the orb had hovered. There was a small hole in the floorboards, the wood splintered downwards where it may have plummeted into the foundations.

"I think the closest you could call it is a seed."

"A plant?"

"Not really."

"You said it is harmless and yet it caused so much destruction and has such powers."

"Well, none of that was technically its fault," he said and looked up through the building to the roof and the sky beyond. "The fire was caused by its shell burning off in the atmosphere and the perception field is just an evolutionary trait. It's more for defence than anything. Sophisticated camouflage."

"And what will this seed grow into?"

"Nothing to worry about," he said, turning and walking towards the door. "I'll pop back from time to time and keep my eye on it, but in about a decade or so it should have matured and be ready to leave. It'll be quite a shock to the neighbours though to wake up and find out the house next door has been in ruins for a decade!"

"But I have so many questions," I said. "Are we to just leave this thing rather than study and learn from it?"

The Doctor paused for a moment as if giving my question serious consideration. Then he replied with some aggression in his voice, "Yes. Unless you'd like me to take you away somewhere and give you some serious study?"

The forcefulness of his tone obliged me to leave and join him on the pavement outside. When I turned back to the house I discovered it had returned to its pristine state and no matter how hard I focused or how much effort I applied it was impossible to see the damage.

"I do not understand. I know that is not real, yet I am unable to see what is really there."

I climbed the steps, resolved to return to the interior. Yet as I reached the door I found myself facing the opposite side of the street, my mind in confusion as to how such a thing might be. Again I tried to enter the building and again I found the impossibility of having it behind me with no recollection as to how that might be. A third attempt yielded the same result.

"No use trying," The Doctor told me. "It will take a mind far stronger than yours to break through that field."

He turned and strode along the street in the direction of my apartment. I considered remaining at the terrace, only elected instead to return later and for now remain with my new companion. Within a few minutes we had returned to my lodgings, my mind full of discounted ideas for how such a thing was possible. No scientific discovery of which I was aware would account for such a thing and I resolved to uncover the seed's power. Indeed, so intense was my consideration of this situation that my head was in quite a state of discomfort and throbbed with some pain behind my brow.

"Headache?" asked The Doctor.

"Indeed, sir," I replied.

He directed his pen-device at me and it emitted its shrill sound and flashing green light. My headache lifted somewhat.

"Just your neurons having a party in that massive cranium of yours. They'll settle in an hour or two. Mind you, by then you won't be able to remember a thing."

"Really, sir!" I exclaimed. "I think I shall remember this quite clearly for some years to come!"

The Doctor smiled out of the corner of his mouth and made for the door.

"I very much doubt it, Doyle," he replied.

His smile was the last thing of him I recalled.