Gloria felt like laughing, so she did. “Oui,” she said in high-school French. “Il est mort.”
The Adventure of the Patient Resident
by Robert L. Fish
© 1979 by Robert L. Fish.
The “vorld’s vurst conzulting detectiff” detects again, and if it is possible to conceive, the one and only Schlock Homes outdoes himself. Above the top of his form, the Great Schlock blazes with deductions and theories, and comes to some of the most startling conclusions of his “conzulting” career...
It was when interesting cases were either rare or non-existent that my friend Mr. Schlock Homes found life most difficult to bear, nor was he loath to pass on his feelings of frustration to me. It made for uncomfortable moments for me, but at the same time the hiatus in work allowed me the necessary time to bring some order to my voluminous notes regarding the many cases I was privileged to share with the man a German acquaintance of ours called, in his delightful accent, the “vorld’s vurst conzulting detectiff.”
I recall in particular one warm sunny afternoon in June in the year ’77, with the shadows just beginning to creep across the ceiling of our quarters at 221B Bagel Street. Homes and I had recently returned home from a visit to France. There, in the chief city of the departement of the Rhone, my friend had successfully tracked down a miscreant using the sewers of the city to give the place a bad odor. I was in the process of putting my notes together under the tentative title of The Adventure of the Lyons’ Main, while Homes, bored almost to distraction by not having a problem to occupy him, was slouched in the basket chair with his violin, playing what even to my untutored ear sounded like An Err on the G-String. I had just decided that some liquid refreshment might aid in my literary efforts, when there came a diffident knock on the door and a moment later our page had entered with the late afternoon post.
Homes quickly put aside his instrument, eagerly taking the packet from the boy and tearing the letters open in order, anxiously seeking some missive that might indicate a problem to test his enormous energies and massive brain. With a sigh I brought my attention from the sideboard to watch, wondering what new adventure for us might be concealed in the formidable pile of correspondence; but as Homes tossed aside piece after piece once he had perused it, and as the smiling look of anticipation on his lean face slowly turned to one of growing disappointment, I shook my head and returned to contemplating the sideboard. Suddenly there was a muffled exclamation from my friend and I looked over at him once again to see Homes gripping an envelope in his hand and staring at it with concentration.
“Homes!” I cried. “What is it?”
“Later, Watney,” he said impatiently, and reached behind him for one of his reference books. He brought it down, found the page he sought, and ran his finger down a column; but instead of satisfying whatever curiosity had led him to the book in the first place, the information he found seemed to puzzle him further. With a frown he returned the book to its proper place on the shelf and continued to finger the envelope as if intrigued by it.
“But, Homes,” I repeated. “What is it?”
“A rather interesting problem,” he replied, and tapped the envelope with his finger. “To begin with, the letter appears to have been misdirected, for it is not addressed to me, but rather to a certain ‘The Resident.’ I can only assume the ‘The’ to be an abbreviation for the name ‘Theodore,’ but there is no Theodore Resident in the London Directory. As a matter of fact, the directory shows no person named Resident with any first name.”
“How extremely odd, Homes!” I exclaimed.
“Yes,” he replied. “Still, the address is quite clear — 221B Bagel Street — so I can only assume the message was intended for me, although the false name, I am sure, has some meaning for the writer.”
With a shrug that indicated he was merely putting the matter of the name aside for the moment and would return to it in time, he slit the envelope with his pocket-knife and withdrew the contents, unfolding the single sheet the envelope contained. I rose and came to stand at my friend’s side, reading over his shoulder. The sheet he had unfolded appeared to me to be nothing more than an ordinary advertisement, and one which made little sense to me. Little did I know that the words on that innocent-looking sheet of paper were to lead to one of Homes’s most interesting cases, and one which I now find in my notes as The Adventure of the Patient Resident. At the moment I was only puzzled at the strange words, which I reproduce below for the reader:
“Homes,” I cried, “what nonsense! Can you make the slightest sense of this gibberish?”
“Oh, I should hardly call it gibberish,” Homes replied, with that insufferable air of superiority he always employed when explaining something which was clear as crystal to him, but which I found unfathomable. “It is, as you can see, an advertisement.”
“I understand that, Homes,” I said, hurt that he should think me that obtuse. “But for what?”
“Really, Watney,” he said, frowning at me. “At times you try my patience. It is, obviously, an advertisement for a new restaurant. And,” he added, wrinkling his nose, “an advertisement I find unbearably offensive in its attempt to be what the newer generation calls ‘cute.’ I am, as you know, Watney, a most patient man, but there are limits to that patience. I find as I grow older an increasing dislike for that childish attempt at cleverness as evidenced by this advertisement. The idiots,” he added, “are also unable to spell!”
“Spell? Cute? A new restaurant, Homes?” I asked, mystified, and considered the advertisement again. “Is that what a ‘cinema’ is?”
“I have no idea what the derivation of the word might be,” he replied. “It sounds like an Indian spice, possibly related to cinnamon, but definitely culinary. Still, to think of any spice, particularly cinnamon, being added to pancreas — which they have misspelled, and which we know as sweetbreads — is unthinkable!”
I stared in profound admiration as my friend ran his finger down the list and continued his discourse.
“Whatever they refer to in the argot as being ‘dandy,’ I cannot imagine it, or anything else, being smothered in aspic!
“Undercover!” said he with a snort. “Possibly pheasant, or more likely, simple chicken. And if pheasant, undoubtedly of poor quality or they would have identified more precisely what they are serving under cover!
“The rulers of the sea, of course, are shark, and while I have heard that some people consider the flesh of this predator to be palatable, I should not care for it myself.”
I nodded in agreement. “And the stromboli?”
“An Italian pasta, obviously. You see, they advertise the cuisine as being of international character.” He continued down the list. “And the fact that on Thursdays they openly admit they serve en counters, and not on the regular tables, undoubtedly to save napery, does not speak very highly of the establishment. Not to mention the fact that they wait until Saturday, when they have the leftovers of the entire week at their disposal, before they serve Japanese food!”
“The cygne I understand,” I said, proud to be able to contribute. “That is the French word for swan, is it not?”