When I dismounted at Baker Street, I had only the pleasant feeling of having performed my doctorly functions well. For a few minutes, Holmes listened while I told him of what this young man had put himself through, and how many toes he had been willing to smash to meet his goal of being elegant from head to many toes at his dance.

"He had nine extras, counting the errant toe on the top," I told my friend. He even had me sketching the presumed placement of the bones when I stopped short.

"You gave Mr. Limstock lines to recite."

"Yes. He's a charming lad with much to say, but I wanted to trust he would not speak too freely."

"He was most anxious to impress you, Holmes, and so he played his part well." Holmes flushed slightly over his young admirer.

"And though I also comported myself very well, I should have appreciated knowing what was going to happen!" I exclaimed. "You said you would be in disguise and watching to see if we were followed or someone in the lobby seemed to be observing us. The constables came rather quickly, and if I hadn't been actively treating a wound it would have been very difficult to establish that I am not in the habit of purchasing a young man's company!"

Holmes got up and poured me a drink, which I accepted gratefuly. "Watson, you do best under pressure. It's a well-established fact. Many soldiers are the same."

"Do you take a certain pleasure at withholding information from me?" I spluttered.

"It had to be thus, but only this time, Watson. It was essential that you hand in the chit to the concierge as if you were a nervous man hoping only for this sensitive transaction to be over so that you could gain the privacy of your room."

"It was highly embarrassing with that winsome Mr. Limstock lurking in the background," I muttered.

"Precisely what you should have felt," the detective assured me. "Once you were in the room, you would have been immediately more confident once reunited with your bag, which I engineered to arrive before you. Am I correct?"

"How could I think of anything else once I saw those mistreated feet!"

"This was the real reason for the surprise," my friend said. "For I know Dr. John Watson would think of nothing else but treating whatever injury had a healthy young man sidling on the edges of his feet. You would have walked right in to that hotel with a doctor's bearing, and not a lover's, if I managed to get you there at all."

"I suppose you're right in this case," I said grudgingly. "What this boy did to himself in the name of a dance. I still can't picture it—a whole string section set up amidst the sawdust or the hay."

"I have heard these men's dances are a singular experience," Holmes said with an odd lilt.

"You wouldn't. I've never known you to dance!"

"With a partner of my interest, I might find it a compelling experience."

"Perhaps Bruno's visit will coincide with a ball in the future," I comforted him. "He strikes me as a graceful sort, and he is certainly fearless."

"He would not mind my attendance without him, were I to have no specific partner," the detective continued.

"But Holmes, do you even know how?" was my question. He seemed to have been deprived of all other aspects of a normal adolescence, so where would he have learned to dance?

"Not particularly well, but a waltz doesn't require very much skill. I think it is actually to my advantage that I have no set habits to re-teach myself."

"Re-teach? You wouldn't play the man's role?" This was beyond my comprehension.

"I am a man, Watson. And no, I shouldn't like to learn steps that I will only have to unlearn when Bruno is here to lead. That's where any fumbling comes in, I gather."

He gazed at me placidly.

Suddenly I started in my chair. "You wish to learn from me? I'm not an excellent dancer, but I suppose I could teach you, should you have an opportunity when Bruno is visiting." This nostalgia for his absent partner was quite touching. "It is nice that you admit you miss him during these absences you claim not to affect you at all," I couldn't help finishing.

My companion stared at me. "What are you talking about, Watson? I need your assistance so that I will be assured a partner at this famous secret dance. There will be few who are skilled at the passive role, so I hear, and having my choice of partners is preferable." His expression was growing colder and colder. "Perhaps you should consult your writings on my character. I'm not a romantic."

"Of course not," I said soothingly, not wishing to force him to admit his pain. I stood up. "This exercise will be just like one of your experiments to see if it is possible to unlock a series of complex bolts while holding a full-grown man on your shoulders. We'll manage."

"Precisely." He stood up and shook my hand.

We cleared away the furniture and put on the phonograph.

I poised his hands in the right position. When I placed my hand on his waist and used the other to grasp his bony palm, it forced me to face the detective's expectant, studious expression at such close proximity, I almost laughed. But this seemingly trivial exercise needed all my concentration.

To distract from the awkwardness of the first steps, I tried to converse. "Young Mr. Limstock conducted himself well, but I'm afraid his head is filled entirely with dancing, fashion and the latest romances in his set. Why should you entrust him with a sensitive mission?"

"It seemed the safest use for the attentions of this sweet young chap. Twice I've been watching a nocturnal venue and turned around to see Mr. Limstock watching me from farther down the street!"

I burst out laughing at the image of a besotted youth interfering with the great detective's workings, and Holmes laughed with me. "For his safety and my anonymity, I had to redirect his energies to something useful. It matters not if he chooses to gossip about helping the great Sherlock Holmes. I prefer it to the alternative story he would circulate—as would Bruno."

"A sweet young chap.' That's a rather warm description, coming from you," I jested. "Perhaps Bruno wouldn't prefer you to be spending time with this handsome lad at all."

We almost crashed into the mantle and Holmes confided in my ear, "I am tremendously jealous that you get to consult with him at his dwelling."

"Holmes!" This interest in such a young man seemed highly improper—and disrespectful to his sworn love.

"What a case of polydactyly, Dr. Watson. It was one of my theories for his irregular gait, although I could have never expected so many extra digits. I am dying to see these feet, especially the errant toe, as you so poetically called it. There must be some sort of family history, but alas, if Bruno were to ever hear I had visited a man in his home, I would never hear the end of it. He would not accept my fascination with the bizarre at face value, as you would."

The music ended as our feet became tangled and we nearly lost our footing. I extricated myself to restart the recording. The long evening was beginning to wear on me.

"I am not accustomed to partners who are taller than I am," I grunted as we swung into motion. "But if you would only remember that I am the man, and you are to follow me."

"I am a man, Watson." He stepped sharply on my foot.

"I am aware of this, because no young lady wears size ten boots and fights my every move with the strength of a pugilist."

"If you're going to lead, then lead. If the situation were reversed, I would leave you no doubt as to the next move."

At this I began reciting my moves aloud: "Left, two three, right, two, three."

"That is making matters worse, because you are referring to your left and your right," Holmes hissed.

"Stop thinking so much," I advised the brittle form in my arms. " A partner is supposed to be supple, light on her feet, responsive. You're a mass of tension and you're making me nervous."

"And I feel quite certain your dancing is very inferior, Doctor, because you make me feel quite unnecessarily foolish. But you are the only instructor available, so perhaps we can avoid the characterizations and focus on the task."

The absurdity of the situation had us both on edge. Our feet were frequently trodden upon and we struggled not to run into the furniture. Where normally we could use each other to establish the likely direction of a projectile with the greatest trust, a little waltz was threatening our friendship with a free exchange of insults like nothing ever before.

We were just managing to avoid running into a chair and keeping ourselves upright by force when we heard:

"All I need is another baritsu fighter in my house, Mr. Holmes," a nightdress-clad Mrs. Hudson said, holding her sides and laughing. "I think you have much to learn, Doctor. I do appreciate that you moved the furniture for once, but please, while you do your exercises," she darted into the room and grabbed a lamp, "Let me hold on to the last fine piece of glassware in this house for safekeeping."

"Certainly Mrs. Hudson," I said politely from where we had frozen in place with our arms dropped to our sides.

"Was the music too loud?" my partner asked. "We thought it would be more pleasant to listen to than Dr. Watson's complaints. He is quite out of form."

"I didn't heed any music," the lady replied. "The stomping around made me worried that one of your criminal re-enactments had gone too far."

When she left we each found a cigarette and took up a stance in opposite corners of the room.

"How long do you estimate she was standing there?" I asked as the blood finally began to leave my face.

Holmes answered airily, "I tell you Watson, a consulting detective never has to make an excuse for anything. And she thought it was your poor showing, not mine."

Fortified with a quick drink, we were back at it again, this time with the music muffled so that we should hear the stairs creak if someone were to climb up to see us.

At least as much for my sake as his, I stopped and said, "Holmes, I have an idea." I retrieved one of the dark scarves we've used for other experiments and made to blindfold him. "It's the only way for you to rely on my lead," I said when he checked my gesture.

He went to the mantelpiece and picked up a small pot of something from behind a statue. "Bruno's hair pomade. Otherwise I would still be excruciatingly aware that I am in the arms of a doctor who has spent all day in his surgery smelling of camphor and alcohol."

He anointed the handkerchief with a small amount of the pomade, inhaled deeply, smiled, and let me affix it over his eyes. "I'm convinced Bruno left a nearly full jar with me because he knows how strongly this Italian confection reminds me of him." He held out his arms and I placed them correctly. "You're a little taller, Watson, but what is most distracting is the fact that your wounded left leg is noticeably shorter than your right now that I am connected to your movements. I shall have to pretend Bruno is wearing an ill-fitting pair of shoes."

I reached over and started the music.

The effect was miraculous.

My companion allowed himself to be led, and soon that magical sympathy that grows up between partners had us moving around the room very fluidly. Even more significantly, I was no longer faced by a grim countenance trying to master a lesson. Holmes smiled. I became very sure that he had successfully imagined me into his paramour because his waist became sensitive and yielding. One of his hands at my neck strayed just up to the edge of my hair.

For the first time in all our grappling, I got a violent jolt at this quasi-incest we were engaging in, and I almost pulled back from this man who could be my brother. Luckily, I mastered the instinct in time to give Holmes the rest of the dance he might never enjoy with the partner he might never see again. If I could give him a few more moments of imagined happiness, than I would do so.

Finally, the music ended. Holmes stood there with his lips slightly parted and cheeks flushed.

"Holmes."

"Hm?"

"Holmes," I made a move to disengage.

He stumbled backwards and I caught him before he thwacked his head on the mantelpiece. He struggled out of the scarf.

"That was rather better," I said to smooth over the discomfort of the moment.

"Quite. But I won't be able to rely on this trick at the dance if I wish to detect the interloper. And I still find whirling around the room to be the least comfortable way to observe."

For the next several nights, we alternated with the scarf and without until finally our bodies became accustomed to each other and our eyes could ignore those of our closest friend.

Then I brought out the blindfold again, so that I could lead Holmes into the parlor after I had prepared it with certain alterations that he must detect while being spun around the room by his dancing partner.

This made any residual tension fall away, as the sleuth could be a sleuth once more without concentrating on how he appeared on the dance floor.

"After all our practice, I am rather looking forward to this dance," I admitted, now that we were perfectly comfortable talking while we waltzed, although the other selections in our limited dancing repertoire were less fluid. "Perhaps it is merely a curiosity for me, but I can't imagine why so many people would take such a risk, especially with the possibility of an intruder in attendance. If our landlady weren't accustomed to every extravagance from us, she might have had some objections to our dancing in the privacy of our rooms."

"And I tell you once again, Watson, that you are right, but even the great Treacher is powerless to call it off. You are aware that this event, like several others in my world, occurs by word of mouth, and there is only a rough estimate of when the great ball will be held. We know it will be sometime between the seventh and the twenty-first of June. During that time, interested men will have their evening dress at the ready and when they receive a signal through the network, they will dash off to the location, have an enjoyable hour or two with friends, and then dash off before anyone is the wiser. Just as the musicians will be ready with their instruments, with several extra on hand, in case some are engaged for the night."

Deftly, I moved us around the tricky spot where the carpet ended. "Couldn't the all-powerful Treacher send out a decree that this is hardly the time for revelry?"

"He's tried. And everyone has taken these pronouncements as his attempt to cover over the fact that there is to be a ball or that he might be involved. You see the predicament."

"Will the great Treacher be in attendance?" I suddenly asked. The evening seemed far less elegant in my mind."

"No, Watson. His hand is known to be in every pie in that part of town, but the man himself will be at his tavern as usual, because it must seem like a normal night. It is really a select few who will be across town listening to the strains of the string players and grasping on to their partner's arms. Not all of them will be as prepared as I," he smiled. Then he continued informing me of the mechanics of this mysterious affair.

"And of these select invitees, only the very few, probably no more than five men, are the organizers and possess the information of where the dance will be held, if there are not indeed two possibilities, in case one of them should be compromised. They take care that the place is sufficiently lighted and absolutely secure, and congratulate themselves that they have brought a fleeting joy to others whose happiness is always measured in small amounts."

"Perhaps." I switched the music on the phonograph to a mazurka. "Even though I can't imagine dancing with a man other than you, much less in public, I would not like Inspector Lestrade, say, to appear at my shoulder while I'm watching the proceedings."

"You are free not to attend."

"After all this preparation! I plan on seeing my pupil enact his lessons!"

Though it didn't seem so at first, the dancing lessons were the easiest part of this investigation. The morning after my escapade with at the hotel, I came to breakfast that had already been covered over by layers of paper.

I unearthed my egg and the basket of toast along with a ration of bacon. "What's this Holmes? Are you putting together a genealogy?" For the papers had been distributed in the form of a very complex family tree, complete with symbols and colors such as we had employed for family histories.

Holmes threw up his hands in disgust. "I wish these last several weeks had been devoted to finding out who begat whom, Watson. What you see are the far more complicated mating habits of the men's clubs."

I spilled the coffee mid-pour and he snatched up one of the sheets.

"You've been tracking people's romantic liaisons?" My eyes tried to comprehend the vast network of lines and focused on one name with many connections. "Is this Angus the violin player? I had no idea that he was so sought-after."

Holmes made a noise of disgust. "Perhaps I should have sent you to gather these facts, Watson, because I took no pleasure in prying into others' intimacy. Do not worry, no one was even aware that I was collecting this information, some of which I had gathered without having to ask. You know my methods."

This was one of the first times I had heard Holmes bow to anyone's privacy, but then, this chart was the first extensive look at others' sexual as well as social habits. I did feel rather uncomfortable with so many people's very dangerous secrets littered across our breakfast table. "Do what you need to do and burn it all," I advised. "What are you trying to accomplish, anyway?"

"The red names have all received these letters warning them that they have been seen in a compromising place." He pointed to his own name. "The green marks with the connecting lines are people who are known to have been with that person on that evening, thought of course that is impossible to determine with any degree of certainty. And the blue stars indicate those who have been questioned by the authorities for some reason or another."

I studied the markings and compared them to my knowledge of the letters. There were more blue marks than I would have imagined. "Morris, the tall fellow with the goatee, was advised he was seen at a certain locale. His friend, Lyle, was also there that evening—this means what, exactly?"

"It is very possible that a Lyle or a Morris or an Angus is, in fact, being blackmailed. Someone could be trying to squeeze all the valuable secrets of this clandestine world by pressing this one man, and because he has no desire to be humiliated or imprisoned, he has no choice but to comply. Such a person would be well placed to see who took the chit, or to know which couples habitually meet in hotels."

"Yet the letters are benign," I pointed out.

"The letters are written because he has close friends whom he wishes to protect from any harm—hence the polite warnings many of us have received."

"Still—that leaves everyone else," I pointed out. "A man could be informing on his acquaintances, the people we see over a drink or for dinner, and acting like nothing is wrong." It was a chilling situation, given that so many men we frequented were either married or had a high position in society, and thus had so much to lose.

Holmes lit a cigarette. "But I have amassed some portion of the relationships surrounding the letter recipients, and I find no pattern. I had hoped to see links based on friendship, romance or animosity. Whole groups of men who were being warned because one person cared about all of them." He groaned. "Instead there are some men whose lovers are completely unaware of other affairs, and now I have to feign ignorance." He rubbed his face.

I suddenly realized that he was more burdened by this case than others, and I felt guilty for not realizing how the threat of exposure would affect him much more than I. "How can I help, Holmes?"

"Help me lock these in the safe, first of all," he said, beginning to gather the papers. We soon shut the door on the incendiary information.

"As to your question, would you like to go out with me this evening? And every other evening until we divine the real threat?"

Of course I would go, though there were fewer and fewer men willing to risk congregating in specialized locales, and many others had moved to meetings in more transited restaurants. Some were convinced that having a drink in a converted storeroom could not be reprehensible, however, and the theater crowd, especially, as well as the musicians, needed a place to make a little noise.

But once I had begun to understand that a member of the club was very likely a turncoat, it changed my perception of these once-enjoyable outings.

For the first time, I began to understand how costly these get-togethers could be. Far from the quarrels common at a normal tavern, at these secret places there was never any impropriety, for everyone understood the danger of drawing attention to these well-behaved drinking parties. But then, with Holmes by my side, it was easy to feel invulnerable.

We knew many men at Scotland Yard and on the local constabularies. Holmes and I were probably the only two men in London who could be fished out of a raid in the thieves' district, an opium den or a brothel and be met with a warm welcome along the lines of, "Hullo, gentlemen, on a case?" and a presumption of innocence.

After several evenings of watching my friends and acquaintances for signs of a desperate turncoat who was watching us, I began to feel very morose. For some reason, this inspection made me feel like the disloyal one, and that made me understand how much I had come to value these social opportunities over those available elsewhere in town.

Now, I am much more social than Sherlock Holmes ever was or could be, but this craving for human warmth has always been checked by an intermittent shyness. I can talk to most people, but to only a few can I say what I really mean. I had always thought I would flourish in an artistic atmosphere, but never had a way to break into these circles. Now, I find a greater relaxation in the back rooms of London's cafés and taverns than I had ever hoped to find.

This is what I was reflecting one Friday while drinking more quickly than someone on a case should allow himself. Holmes had been in and out of the Green Lion's basement all night. It was one of those evenings when many were talking quietly after a discussion of the anonymous letter problem, difficulties with the hotels and a general sense that the authorities were watching. To lighten the mood, someone had coaxed Paul Drummond to the front of the room.

All human sounds died away, and Mr. Drummond, who was an actor and sometime singer, began his repertoire of birdcalls. He claimed to know every species to be heard in the British Isles, and I always found him to be a marvel.

On this night, tears were coming to my eyes. What if all of this were to end? This society that had been so welcoming to me, it was terribly fragile, and pressed in the right way it could crumble.

"There, there, Doctor, you're drinking yourself into a state," my neighbor said with those queer resounding t's that were part of his Slavic accent.

I looked over and saw a man I recognized as a set painter, musician and jack-of-all-trades in the theater district.

"Stanley!"

There was no one I would rather spend a maudlin moment with. Stanley was my first friend in these circles, and he was a wonderful drinking partner, for the reason that he seldom spoke.

I didn't know this from our first meeting, of course, because he spoke quite a bit. It was one of my first forays into the men's clubs, and Holmes had promptly abandoned me to an awkward perch in a corner. Suddenly, this big fellow was by my side, introducing me to nearly every man from the theater group with his thickly accented voice.

His given name was presumed to be Stanislaus, but no one knew his last name—it was apparently so unpronounceably Slavic that everyone had given up on it. He was Lithuanian, I had been told, and he had long, untidy, wheat-colored hair and a sloping brow, as well as immensely broad shoulders. Stanley was at least four inches taller than Holmes, who was six feet.

"So Stanley's adopted you," one of the actors said to me that first night when my new acquaintance had retired to a corner with his drink. "It happens only rarely. The gentle giant doesn't like to see anyone uncomfortable."

"More like if he sees someone looking out of place, he hopes to find another runt of the litter," another actor said archly.

They explained to me that no one knew much about Stanley because the man seldom said anything. He replied to most questions with his two expressions—a childlike joy and a black scowl—but in either case he caused no trouble, and so people treated him as a sort of mascot. For the gentleman's clubs Holmes introduced me to were just that—for gentlemen. Scene painters like Stanley tended to gravitate towards tradesmen's taverns.

But the silent Slav appeared sure of two things—that he could perform almost any function backstage and that he belonged with these gentlemen who had an interest in each other. Whenever I saw him he was always dressed the same—a wide-sleeved Russian blouse, usually spattered with paint, a sort of rustic vest in which he hid a small sketchpad, and a fancy-dress jacket that could have just as easily been for a footman as for the man he served, but that at least fit his bulk like a glove.

"He's not only an astonishingly good scene painter, one of the best I've ever seen," one of the actors said to me that first night. "Stanley can also play several instruments. It's very easy to forget such a big presence is even there, with so much noise going on at the theater. One evening it turned out that we had no violinist to play a very technical theme for a romance that the director called a 'Amelia's Air.' The entire cast and crew was assembled, watching the director was tearing out his hair because there was no one to replace the musician who was ill. 'Where is my Air? I must have my Air!' he was shouting."

"I believe I know the director in question," a listening actor said wryly.

"But Stanley was hiding in the wings as usual, and he must have heard it all," continued the man who was telling me the story. "For while the director was shouting himself hoarse we heard a sound. It was this very haunting, very difficult music being played on a violin with more skill than even the regular violinist.

"We all crept closer to the source of the music, and it was Stanley. Since no one had any idea that this coarse man could play, or even that he followed what was going on around him sometimes, it was miraculous. But when everyone applauded, he ran off into his lair in some corner. Gradually, he was coaxed out, but he refused to play from the orchestra pit.

"And so the director allowed him to play from the wings, and the first time the audience heard this emotional violin music coming from an unexpected place, they gasped. From then on, that was the way the violin part was played."

I was then unaccustomed to conversing with actors, and thought that most of the story's charm was in the man who told it. But another part of me recognized that Stanley was a true eccentric, someone worth paying attention to.

"He's a savant, you see, Doctor. He has an uncommonly kind nature, but he is absolutely terrified of people at the same time," commented someone else.

"He seems so simple, it's hard to imagine that he's ever been with a man," another whispered. "But Stanley's out at least once a week, happy or sad, for a little company."

From that night onward, I did try to keep an eye out for Stanley in the cafés and private taverns to which he gravitated for some reason. People were always surprised that he spoke quite clearly with me, because listening to him try to articulate a sentence was a most painful experience.

The rhythm of his speech reminded me of trying to pour coins out of a narrow-necked bottle. There was nothing, then a few words, then a tremendous effort produced a sentence at most. Then the process was repeated. Rather than subjecting himself or anyone else to this struggle, Stanley preferred to express himself in the brilliant sketches he dashed off like nothing and often presented to the subject.

But with me, it was different. I induced him to tell me of his native regions and his travels and he spoke well, sometimes with a surprising vocabulary for a foreigner. Other times he asked me questions about India, a place he very much wanted to visit. And the laconic man also showed some wry wit in his descriptions of the theatrical world that so fascinated me.

In his own way, he was an observer at the clubs, an outsider like me, though for a different reason, so his company was always most agreeable to me. After all, I was tongue-tied myself compared to the razor-tongued actors and other wags who dominated these circles.

The reader will understand, then, why I was delighted to share my inebriation with the one person in the room who was likely to understand me.

"It's so beautiful, it's just so beautiful," I said of the birdcalls. Stanley patted my arm.

"I came out tonight hoping to see you, Doctor," he said. He drew out a paper from his vest. "I've had one of those messages you and Mr. Holmes are investigating. It arrived Wednesday morning."

"'Don't go out this evening. A friend,'" I read aloud. "Did it come in an envelope?"

He shrugged. "It got wet at the theater, but there was no postmark."

My mind cleared somewhat. "This is very strange. I have not heard of anyone receiving a warning before going out." My melancholy returned. "It still can mean nothing healthful that there is someone watching all of us, most likely from within the same room." I gestured widely with my glass and then downed the contents.

The birdcalls had finished and the other men were circulating in the low-ceilinged room. "Now, it's not worth getting upset about, Doctor," Stanley comforted me. "I don't believe it is one of our fellows who has been writing these letters."

My drunken brain struggled to remember the day. "There was a raid Wednesday night, wasn't there?" When I'd come in, there had been men talking in a hush about the police descending upon a small room operated by a restaurant, Grimley's. It seemed so long ago.

"I heard there had been one, but you must understand that I've been working very hard for days. I slept at the theater Wednesday and Thursday." The great brow lowered. "I wish I'd noticed the envelope at my door sooner. You see, Doctor, not ten men in the city know where I live, and I pick up what little post I receive from the post office. Receiving any correspondence at all frightened me," he said with that open way he had.

"It will be fine, Stanley, you'll see. Mr. Holmes and I, we—" I broke off. "Why do you think it couldn't have been one of the men here?" I asked.

"Because the private room at Grimley's will be shut down for some time due to the police. Why would any of us want to have fewer places to go?"

I was gaping at Stanley because he was thinking much more logically than I thought him capable. "And if it isn't one of our group," I said with unusual ownership, "Then who could it be?"

He leaned close to my ear and whispered, "The police."

I threw back my head and roared with laughter. In some faraway place, I was aware I was making a spectacle of myself, but Stanley put another drink in front of me and made me drink it down like medicine.

"Better? Listen very quietly."

He put his mouth to my ear and explained his preposterous idea in a low voice. Only the police would know there would be a raid. The authorities would be able to locate him because he'd been "pinched" a few times, he didn't say for what.

"You, Stanley, you were found—doing—by the police?" I couldn't imagine him doing something illicit in a public place.

"I talked my way out of it," Several people at in the room were shooting incredulous glances at me for being able to draw out Stanley into more than one complete sentence, so the idea that he would be able to wheedle his way out of a morals charge seemed highly improbable. Still, when I studied him for some kind of police-bending charm, I found it.

He grinned at my drunken wonder. "Ssh," he said in one long drawn-out sound with his finger before his mysterious face.

I wound up for another guffaw and he thumped me on the back. "It's the only explanation, Doctor. I'm sure tomorrow you'll see it my way."

"I see it your way now, my good chap!" Suddenly I became concerned that my elusive companion would see fit to run off the way he usually did at some point in an evening. I wasn't going to allow my clue to escape. "Tell me about your country."

He was unusually willing to do so that night, and when I mentioned his musical ability that he normally guarded very closely, he surprised me and everyone by bursting into some mournful song in some foreign language. His fine baritone voice silenced the room in a moment, and when he was done, I wouldn't let him become embarrassed so I ordered us another.

And another. I remember thinking that Stanley was the symbol of everything noble yet misunderstood that I wished to protect, even from the police.

Holmes re-entered the room and found me clutching onto the stagehand's arm as if he would run away. "Sherlock! I found a clue!"

I'd not let go of the beefy arm attached to Stanley, and I raised it with difficulty before collapsing under its weight.

My clue helped me out of the chair and between them they carried me to a cab. "Tell him, Stanley, tell him we had it all wrong! Holmes! Don't let him run away like he does!"

"Ssh, Doctor, you may relax yourself. I will go nowhere until you bid me to," the accented voice bade me, and I concentrated upon withstanding the nausea-inducing cab ride home.

The next morning I crawled out of a bed I did not remember getting into. My clue was in the parlor with a blanket over his knees and his enormous workman's boots on the floor. Evidently Stanley had been induced to spend the night.

"Did he tell you?" I croaked to the detective.

Holmes poured me some tea and I sipped it cautiously.

"I saw the letter, and I heard Stanley's theory. You did a fine job last evening, Doctor, and I hope your heroic headache goes away quickly. For that you can blame Stanley, who knew perfectly well that I am collecting such letters and he should have brought it to me, no whiskey necessary, without delay."

Here the reader must allow me a little writerly license. For if I were to write down every stutter and long pause in Stanley's speech, it would make for very tiresome reading. And so I ask you to imagine the mutually frustrating experience it was for a tongue-tied Stanley to try to explain himself to Sherlock Holmes, and for a very impatient detective to wait for said guest to find the right words to answer his rapid-fire questions.

Suffice it to say, that our co-conspirator was already red-faced and miserable from jogging the faulty valve of his speech, and my roommate was at the end of his patience.

"I was working on a set, Mr. Holmes. It was a big job, a rush job. I was so concerned I didn't see the letter, er, I did see it, I stepped over it, but I took no note of a bit of trash. And had I read it, I would have thought nothing, sir. My mind was on the painting job that kept me away from the back room at Grimley's, where I might have otherwise joined some of the fellows from the show. It's one of those plays set in a palace, and the director would have all that trompe—trompe—"

"Trompe l'oeil," Holmes snapped.

"And I'm one of the only ones that does it the way it ought to be done. That's the truth, sir. There was so much to be done I slept in the theater, when I did sleep. When my job was through Friday evening I went out for a drink, and you can see I brought the letter last night to show one of you. And I did, didn't I, Doctor?"

The bulky scene painter was withering under Holmes' least-gentle interrogation techniques.

"Quiet down, both of you," I complained while attempting to swallow a tonic. "Speak to me, Stanley, very softly, and tell me everything."

Once more, my presence worked its magic, and soon the big man was speaking fluently and gesturing with a piece of toast in one hand and a cup of tea in the other as if he presided over our parlor any day of the week.

The men explained their discoveries from the morning. Stanley had, of course, never had the benefit of seeing all the other letters and their dates spread before him. Together, he and Holmes were able to isolate the pattern that had long eluded the detective.

Though the painter hadn't received a letter before Wednesday, he had been at each of the gatherings that had occasioned a letter to someone else.

"Stanley has an admirer in the police force," Holmes summed up.

The blonde features reddened. "I've heard there are men of our persuasion in every walk of life, so why not the police?" Stanley shrugged.

"Then why wouldn't this person write only to Stanley?" I asked.

"Because repeated letters to the same man would be very compromising. Someone on the force would realize that," Holmes said. "This method was more oblique, but he counted on perhaps greater communication in the café set than really exists."

"I go my own way, float from group to group," Stanley explained. "I can sit down at a table with nearly any man and be welcomed. But no one knows where I live." He scanned my face anxiously.

"We will tell no one your place of residence," I assured him.

"Then I can tell you gentlemen that I live on a boat. I pick up my mail at the post office, but this one came to my door on the canal. It gave me a bit of a jolt when I finally recognized it as a letter."

"The police would have a record of his location or could find it if need be," I observed.

"And they might have a record of those who have detained and released him in the past, though I am not sure how to obtain this information, which would not have been recorded, since our friend cannot recall anything useful about those occasions," Holmes said severely.

This was the point at which I would normally rein in the detective's fervor, and I struggled to live up to my role this morning with a cool cloth over my eyes. "Holmes, stop frightening Stanley. He's not used to people browbeating him, which is why he works behind the scenes, where it is relatively quiet, rather than being subject to angry directors and hostile audiences, though he undoubtedly would have a charming presence on the stage."

I heard a gasp from the Slav's direction. "Stanley, you may go. Thank you very much for sharing the letter and all the toasts I vaguely remember having with you. If we have more questions, I will contact you very politely at the theater and with my detective on a leash. Now if you will both excuse me," I stumbled blindly into my bedchamber and knew nothing for several hours.

When I awoke, Holmes brought me my broth in bed.

"Was I so terrible to Friend Stanley? How did you know he would have liked to be an actor?" he asked me.

"Because he's a combination of gregarious and timid that normally means a frustrated kind of life."

Sherlock Holmes flinched at the brutality in my voice, which he would have no way of knowing was directed at myself.

"This is a difficult case, Watson. Perhaps it wears on you more than upon me. My insensitivity saves me."

"Perhaps." I saw signs that Holmes was unusually affected by the case, but I did not wish to insist upon the point.

I finished the broth and lay my head on the pillow. Holmes brought me the thermometer and I had a low fever. I was well aware that the infection had entered me some time back and I had been fighting it all this time. Only I could know that I was going through some psychical crisis rather than a physical one, but I took advantage of those couple of red notches above normal and stayed in bed for a day, something that normally requires a bullet wound.

At last, dear reader, the time has come to tell you exactly why I despise Mr. Treacher.