A nifty little oneshot about Holmes' eating habits.
Breakfast was by no means a normal affair in the home of 221b Baker Street. Indeed, unless he was off-duty- which was in and of itself unusual- Holmes hardly had a bite to eat until he had exercised his every effort upon the case in front of him.
I had on several occasions encouraged Holmes to have at least a few bites to eat before the long day ahead. On such occasions, Holmes would merely eye me over his newspaper before stating, "My dear Watson, you would do well not concern to yourself with such matters. While I would consider you to be my doctor, there is no need to utilize such expertise on something as impractical as my eating habits. I assure you that it does nothing to impair my judgment or observation. I notice that you rose early this morning to write a letter, likely to one Mr. Wright." Holmes' concluding observations would turn the conversation towards how Holmes had determined the conclusion he had come to ("Watson, it is quite obvious that you have shaved with less light than usual, thereby causing you to not shave as close and to leave the smallest hint of stubble upon your chin and upper lip. As for the letter writing to Mr. Wright, you have a trace of ink upon your right sleeve, which could only have been left by writing a letter. I suspect you made a mistake somewhere along the line, for you had gone back to fix the problem, as shown by the ink farther down your sleeve. You last spoke to Mr. Wright a few days ago and your parting words included that of 'dropping a line' his way in several days time."). This thereby drew me away from such topics as the consistency of his food consumption. After numerous attempts, and just as numerous failures, I dropped the subject altogether.
When Holmes was off a case and was clean enough to sit down at a meal, he ate just as sparingly as when he was on a case. His nimble figure stayed as spry as his food intake.
Yet, though a morsel of food only sparingly passed between his lips, there was no man more active and reflexive than the famous Sherlock Holmes.
