Although I had never revealed to Watson the actual date of my birth, this had not stopped him seeking, apparently by some process of elimination, to determine it. He may have supposed that, since he had only three hundred and sixty five days in a year to choose from, he could only draw so many wrong conclusions before he hit upon the right one. In any event, every year he seemed to choose a date at random - by throwing darts at a calendar, for all I knew - so that I myself never knew when I was to be set upon with gifts and harried into eating cake. As amusing as this was, my landlady at least equaled my flat mate's efforts by her own contribution to the festivities, if she did not surpass them.

Annually, on the random date the two of them conspired to agree I had aged another year, I was for reasons I could only conjecture at treated to a Scotswoman's interpretation of French cuisine. Although, to be fair, I suppose her reasoning was not so opaque. In spite of the fact that I had not been to France since I was very young and hardly remembered the place, nor ever had much connection to my family there, I had once, under the influence of a chemically induced good mood, told Mrs. Hudson that her ratatouille (which had actually had more in common with an English stew) reminded me of something my grandmother had used to make. It was an utter lie, but the good woman had glowed with pride as though all her goals in life had been accomplished. This I suppose was conclusive.

In any event, this year's hopelessly Anglican coq a vin and fruit tart which was probably as traditional amongst my French relations as it was unrecognizable to me, were remarkable not for their obvious if well intentioned failings, and it was not actually the sentiment behind them which was currently making me smile. It was not any chemical I'd seen fit to abuse, either.

It was the fact that, on top of the tart, Mrs. Hudson had constructed a crime scene out of piecrust figures.

One piecrust man lay prone and was obviously the victim. Several others stood over this, looking on in apparent perplexity. The gory red-ness of some fruit in the tart made the effect all the more shocking. It was the most ghastly pastry I had ever seen, it was making Watson uncomfortable, and I had never had a birthday cake I liked better.

It also constituted the first case to come my way that year in which I failed to make any headway.

All the evidence was eaten before I could make a proper examination of it.