The doctor himself sat in a straight-backed chair with a light rug thrown over his lap and the attendant nearby. The erectness of his carriage could be attributed to military bearing though I doubted it. Ives was a man too imperial and commandeering to slouch. He still had a full head of hair though it was white with speckles of grey. His face was deeply wrinkled, far more than Murray's, from decades of tropical sun, though he had lost all traces of suntan. Indeed, he was a trifle pale. Piercing blue eyes peered out from under bushy eyebrows, the only hair on his face. I was not a doctor myself but I could not fail to note the slight wheeze to his breathing, nor the paleness of his skin. All in all, Ives reminded me of a roosted falcon, aging but still capable of inflicting considerable damage on one unlucky enough to cross him.

"Beechem, you may leave us," Ives said crisply. "I am certain two doctors are up to any mishaps that may arise." His voice had the breathy strain common to the elderly yet his enunciation was perfect.

The attendant hesitated until Ives turned to fix him with a pointed glare. With a sigh and a nod in our direction, he headed for the door. Before he left, however, I saw he and Watson exchange knowing, resigned looks. Clearly, time had not softened the old doctor.

"Yes, I am still as crotchety as ever," Ives said, as though reading my mind, though was not addressing me. He gestured for us to sit. "Gotten worse, if anything. Dr. Watson, you're looking well. Far better than last I saw you. And if you say the same about me, I shall lose all respect for your abilities as a doctor."

Watson was already seated. "Well, if were a man of less tact, I should say you are looking far worse than last I saw you. Indeed, I should say that you look downright terrible. Fortunately, I have more diplomacy than to say so to your face."

I was startled, as I had never heard my friend speak in so cavalier a manner, even in jest, but Ives merely grinned. "I thought you could make an accurate diagnosis, if anyone could. Thank you for proving me right. And you, sir. You are Sherlock Holmes, I take it?" I acknowledged that I was, and immediately Ives asked if this were an investigation.

"No," I said, while simultaneously Watson answered, "yes."

While we looked at each other, Ives chuckled. "Would you gentlemen care for some time alone to get your story straight?"

"It is an investigation into a minor matter," Watson clarified before I could reply. Surely he did not mean . . . "It concerns two telegraphs."

For his part, Ives understood immediately. His posture straightened even further and his cold, white hands came together in his lap. "Two telegraphs, to a fellow named Murray. Sent fifteen years ago."

It was not a question but Watson nodded. "Precisely."

"There is but one small problem," Ives replied and I detected a sly glint in his eyes. "There were three telegraphs sent from my hospital in Peshawar to Murray in Kandahar. I sent but two, and those two were in my name."

"The third was sent in Watson's name, though it was not he who sent it," I said.

Ives turned that falcon-stare to me. "And what can you deduce from that, Mr. Holmes?" he asked with a touch of a smirk.

Now Watson turned to look at me as well. I leaned back in my chair and steepled my fingers together. "What I deduce is that you are telling the truth but telling it slant, as an American poet once put it. You did indeed send Henry Murray two telegraphs, and in your name. One revealed details about Watson's bout with enteric fever."

"Dr. Watson very ill. Who is next of kin?" Ives murmured, as though quoting.

"The second telegraph, I presume, said that you would keep Murray informed."

"Will send word if the worst," Ives confirmed softly.

"Murray himself does not recall this message, which is of little surprise to me. It had no features that would stick in a man's head, especially compared with the first and the third telegraphs."

"And the third telegraph?"

"The third you did not send," I answered, while my mind raced through the possibilities. Ives knew there were three telegraphs. He readily admitted sending two; why would he prevaricate about sending the third? No, he told the truth. But who, then?

Wait.

How had Ives known who Murray was in the first place, and thus where to send the telegraphs? Watson had mentioned the siege of Kandahar. Knowing my friend, Watson would have been frantic, trying his best to learn about Murray's fate. He may have told Ives then. But Murray had been assigned to a new officer after the siege, while Watson was ill. And Watson had not learned this until he was recovering, in early October.

The siege had lifted in early September. No doubt Murray tried to contact Watson soon afterwards, but by then Watson was in no condition to receive his mail. The first telegraph to Murray had gone out in the middle of that month.

"You read Watson's mail while he was ill!" I gasped.

"Very good, Mr. Holmes," said Ives shamelessly. "But what does that have to do with the third telegraph?"

In point of fact, nothing. But I was still taken aback by the man's audacity. "It gives me an insight into your lack of character," I barked. "A man who would do such a thing –"

"Holmes!"

Watson, I saw, was also a trifle hot under the collar, but it seemed I was the object of his ire. He leaned back in the chair (having sprung forward at the first exclamation) and looked at me intently. "As the person whose mail was violated, I and I alone reserve the right to berate Ives for reading my mail when I was ill. And have already chosen not to do so."

"Thanked me for it, in fact," Ives put in, smiling faintly.

"Thanked?" This I could not believe. "Why?"

"Because he was dying!" Ives snapped. The old man had gained some color in his anger and his eyebrows fairly bristled. I glanced at Watson, who had not turned a hair at the pronouncement, and then back at Ives.

Ives met my look without flinching. "You don't know how close you came to never having a biographer." It was as though the old soldier knew of my musings of the turns of fate in Southampton. I suppressed a shiver. "He was dying, and the only name I had to go on was Murray's. I hadn't a clue who Murray was -- for all I knew he was a next of kin – and I had to find out somehow. And quickly."

"He's right, Holmes," Watson said quietly. "His methods may not have been regulation," and here there was faint mockery in his tone, directed at me, "but they were the best recourse in the situation. Even I knew I was dying." I gave a start of surprise, and saw Ives do the same. Watson continued, his face calm, almost pensive. "I remember thinking it plainly, one of the few clear and coherent thoughts I had at the time. I was very matter-of-fact about it. "

For a moment Ives's expression softened with sorrow and he looked every minute of his age. Then he looked at me and he was once again the old falcon. "So you see, Mr. Holmes, I am not completely bereft of character as you supposed."

"No," I agreed but once again my mind was on a different track. "In fact, you showed a great deal of compassion for Murray and for Watson when you penned the first, second and third telegraphs."

"I sent only two telegraphs!"

I smiled, perhaps with a touch of maliciousness, at the Ives's insistent tone. "Indeed you did, but you wrote all three."

It made perfect sense. Watson had often written that I eschew emotion, and it is true I strive for objectivity in all things. However, I am perfectly capable of recognizing sentiment when it is displayed before my eyes. Ives was very fond of Watson, and because of that he had extended a courtesy to a man he knew Watson worried over. Ives had had the message sent in Watson's name so as to ease Murray's mind further, implying that Watson was well enough to be sending telegraphs on his own.

Watson sent a questioning look at Ives, who silently stared at the hands folded in his lap. Finally he sighed and looked up at me. "Bravo, Mr. Holmes," he said quietly without a trace of irony. "You do not disappoint."

"I fear you do me too much of an honor," I replied. "I confess I still do not know the sender of the third telegraph, except that he was an able confederate, and a subordinate."

"And how the devil do you know that, sir?"

"Because an equal would have signed his own name, or refused to have anything to do with your scheme. A subordinate would have had no choice and obeyed out of fear . . . or loyalty."

"Foley," Watson said suddenly. He wore an expression I had felt often on my own features, when the pieces of the puzzle fall into place with startling clarity. "The young orderly you put on staff when so many of the regulars had fallen ill. Edward Foley!"

Ives grinned. "And bravo to you as well, Doctor. It seems detection is as contagious as measles. Perhaps I will contract it next."

"Do not make light of this!" Watson protested, and I nearly laughed at how quickly he had gone from defending Ives to haranguing him. "Why did you have to drag that poor boy into your schemes?"

"I didn't," Ives replied, turning his glare onto my friend. "I simply did not have the time to send the third telegraph myself so I gave it to Foley and told him to have it sent off immediately. That was the extent of his involvement. He was a good lad, did as he was told. Unlike some others I could name."

Watson ignored the implication. " 'Was a good lad'?"

"Living in Manchester, I believe, where is family is from. Took up his father's barbering establishment some years ago." Ives idly examined his nails. "The lad had absolutely no business being in the army or a hospital setting. Fortunately he developed a heart condition in early '81 and had to be discharged completely."

"Came upon him quite suddenly?" Watson asked knowingly.

The old man raised his eyes sardonically. "Oh, yes. Just shortly after it became plain to me that if he remained in the army he would not last long."

"And how is his condition now?"

"Very well, I believe. The condition mysteriously cleared up on its own after he returned to England. Quite a strange thing, that." The smile Ives gave us, and its twin on Watson's face, confirmed my suspicions. Reading patients' mail, falsifying serious medical conditions . . . the Army must have been relieved to get rid of him.

The matter of the telegraphs solved, our conversation turned to more social channels until Beechem silently materialized and declared that over three hours had passed. We decided to take our leave. As I shook hands with Ives, he pulled me down closer and whispered, "Keep an eye on that stubborn young fool for me. He seems a trifle more willing to listen to reason now but leopards don't change their spots." I nodded my acquiescence.

I didn't hear what he said to Watson, but judging from the look of amused exasperation, it was something in the same vein as what he had said to me. As we hailed a cab Watson asked, "Just what was it that he said to you?"

"I shall tell you, if you tell me what it was you wrote on your card that gained us entry in the first place."

He smirked. "I wrote 'stubborn old fool.'"

I raised an eyebrow. "Is there significance to that phrase? It is very close to what he called you."

"That is why I wrote it. Now, what did he say to you?"

"He asked me to keep an eye on you. He seemed to think you were apt to get into trouble, even now."

Watson laughed softly. "I'd forgotten that. Ives never did have a high opinion of me in that respect. He once threatened to have me sedated or tied to the bed for a week."

I chose not to ask why. There were some mysteries I did not want to know the solutions to.