THE PROBLEM OF REGINALD
MUSGRAVE
OR
THE MUSGRAVE VERSION OF
HISTORY
In the early
1990's Hurlston Manor in
The papers
were the
account books, ledgers, scrapbooks, journals, and scattered writings of
Reginald Musgrave (1854-1931), the last lord of the manor.
These papers
were quietly
donated to the West Sussex Historical Society by the new owners of the
manor,
The West Sussex Geriatric Care Facility [1]
When the
papers were
examined by the Historical Society, it became apparent that Musgrave
had been a
fan of the renowned detective Mr. Sherlock Holmes, as some of his
scrapbooks
were devoted to Holmes’ exploits. Further investigation of the Musgrave
writings
made this rather obscure find of inestimable historical value.
Reginald
Musgrave had not
merely been a fan of Sherlock Holmes, he
had been an
acquaintance of the great detective. Reginald Musgrave had been
depicted under
his own name in the Sherlock Holmes story, "The Musgrave Ritual."
Beyond that,
Musgrave had
written memoirs about his life-long friendship with Sherlock Holmes.
Once the
relationship between Holmes and Musgrave and the existence of the
memoirs was
announced to the public, a distant branch of the Musgrave family from
the
northern section of
The ensuing
lawsuits
prevented the papers from being thoroughly examined and prepared for
publication by the West Sussex Historical Society and the Sherlock
Holmes
Society of London. As the lawsuits went to court, another suit was
filed that
moved to have the papers declared a hoax or an unauthorized pastiche of
the
works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle; this lawsuit was filed by the estate
of Conan
Doyle. The entanglement of lawsuits effectively kept any serious
research from
being done on the Musgrave documents. The documents could not be
published or
viewed by the general public, but they could be examined by legitimate
scholars. [2]
Hoping to
further its
case, the estate of Conan Doyle was able to have George Alec Effinger deemed a legitimate researcher. He was,
in fact,
searching for material to use in an upcoming anthology of Sherlock
Holmes
pastiches. Once the Wessex Historical
Society
realized what his purpose was, they denied him visitation. Effinger
was left with partial information from the
Musgrave
papers. He used what
little
information he had gleaned to write up the short story that he entitled
"The Musgrave Version.” [3]
As written
"The
Musgrave Version" was more of a teaser for a fuller adventure than a
satisfying Holmes adventure. The first section told of Musgrave's long
friendship with Holmes and how Musgrave had been treated unfairly in
Watson's
account of "The Musgrave Ritual.” [4]
"The
Musgrave Version" took place in 1875 while Holmes and Musgrave were
still
students at
The story ends
at that
point with the teaser:
Just
that simply began our globe spanning series of adventures: the dreadful
partnership of the League of Dragons, between this very same Dr. Fu
Manchu and
Professor James Moriarty: the long harsh trek across Europe to Fu
Manchu's
fortress stronghold within the Forbidden City itself, our escape, our
rescue,
and our mad voyage aboard the submarine Nautilus, our meeting with the
maniacal
Dr. Moreau and his giant rat of Sumatra which John H. Watson
transformed into
the hound of Baskervilles, the murders that Holmes solved in San
Francisco and
the frenzied, failed journey to rescue General George Armstrong Custer
from his
own murdering officers.
The court
cases over the
Musgrave papers dragged on for years. The judges finally ruled that the
Musgrave family had a legitimate claim to half of the papers, yet they
also
bore the responsibility for the property taxes for the manor since the
death of
Reginald Musgrave in 1931. The Musgrave family agreed to sell their
half of the
Musgrave papers to the West Sussex Historical Society for a reduction
in their
payment of accumulated property tax. To spite the Historical Society,
the Musgrave
family kept a couple of the papers as "heirlooms.” It was widely
believed
that they were waiting for an opportunity to sell them at an inflated
price on
the open market.
In 2001,
George Alec Effinger was once again
offered the opportunity to write a
Sherlock Holmes pastiche. Learning that the Musgrave papers were now
available
for public viewing at the West Sussex Historical Society, he believed
that this
would be a good opportunity to complete the adventure Reginald Musgrave
had
alluded to in the story Effinger had
called "The
Musgrave Version"
Effinger soon learned that those papers that he
had
previously seen detailing that adventure were among those the papers
taken by
the Musgrave family. The Musgrave family did not allow anyone to see
their papers.
Effinger resigned himself to writing
something else.
He looked through the rest of the papers to see if there was another
Musgrave
and Holmes adventure he could use. In the papers dated 1927, he found
another
Musgrave and Holmes’ adventure.
Musgrave had to
read it several times to make certain he understood it correctly.
This adventure
began
almost exactly as "The Musgrave Version" with Holmes being hired by Ch'ing Chuan-Fu to find a brass and enamel box,
but
diverged greatly from the earlier published story and lacked mention of
Professor Moriarty, Captain Nemo, and Doctor Moreau. It was also more
detailed
and told of Holmes and Musgrave's trip to
Effinger privately believed that the Conan Doyle
estate was
correct, that Musgrave had written unauthorized pastiches that had been
taken
as authentic cases of Sherlock Holmes by Holmesian
scholars. The two versions of Musgrave's story represented different
drafts of
the same tale, the later version having excised the more fantastic
elements
such as Captain Nemo and Dr. Moreau to make a more realistic
narrative.
While still containing fantastic elements, the second draft was closer
to the
mystery fiction typical of Holmes and Fu Manchu stories.
In both "The
Musgrave
Version" and "The Adventure of the Celestial Snows," a fellow
student at
In both
accounts Ch'ing Chuan-Fu tells Holmes and
Musgrave that Ch'ing Chuan-Fu was a name
he used in
In "The
Musgrave
Version," Fu invites Holmes to his apartment near
At the outset
of "The
Adventure of the Celestial Snows,” Holmes already knows about
brass-and-enamel
box which had been stolen from Fu, wished returned and wanted Holmes to
find
it. Holmes traveled to
The argument
could be made
then that "The Adventure of the Celestial Snows" is a continuation of
"The Musgrave Version,” picking up where the earlier story left off.
However, the action in “The Adventure of the Celestial Snows" that
follows
once Holmes and Musgrave enter Fu's London home does not in the least
resemble
Musgrave's description of the events that occurred after leaving Fu
Manchu's
apartment in "The Musgrave Version.” Beyond this, the Musgrave Papers
also
contained corroborating evidence that some of the events described "The
Musgrave Version" did occur.
Once in London
Holmes and
Musgrave visit Ch'ing Chuan-Fu's home. He
told them
that his problem of the box had almost resolved itself. Fu led them to
the
basement where he had a torture chamber. A man hung on the wall in
shackles.
Musgrave was knocked unconscious. Musgrave awakened to find that he had
been
carried upstairs and placed a small gray blanket. The house had been
stripped
of all its furnishings. Musgrave inspected the house and the prison
below the
house but saw no sign of the prisoner or Holmes.
Two men named
Mayfield and
Powers entered the house and questioned Musgrave. They claimed to have
had some
involvement with the affairs of Dr. Fu Manchu. They claim that Fu
Manchu was
the very Genghis Khan of Crime. They also stated that dacoits were in
the pay
of Dr. Fu Manchu and had come to
They left the
deserted
house and almost immediately. Shortly thereafter, Musgrave,
Mayfield, and
Powers were accosted by dacoits. Farther down the street, Holmes fought
against
four dacoits. He defeated three with the Japanese martial art Baritsu, but the fourth dropped a glass ball
filled with an
anesthetic gas. The gas overwhelmed Holmes and the dacoits captured
him. [5]
According to
Mayfield, the
name of Fu Manchu was widely known and feared from
Arriving in
Musgrave and
the others
were also imprisoned and given short rations. They were informed that
they had
been sentenced to death by order of the Empress but that Fu was working
to have
these sentences removed. They were so informed of this by Fu's servant,
a tall,
muscular Arab named Ali al-Salaam.
Fu Manchu had a
puzzle for
Holmes to solve. He wanted Holmes to discover who was in league with
the
European "pirates." To aid Holmes in solving the mystery, Fu gave him
many of the powders from the box containing the Celestial Snows, one of
which,
according to Musgrave, was cocaine.
Fu Manchu
filled Holmes in
on the backgrounds, characteristics, and mannerisms of those he
suspected might
be part of the conspiracy to overthrow the rule of Madame Tzu Hsi, the Dowager Empress. Fu needed Holmes’
outside perspective
to catch the perpetrator because he was too close to the problem.
Fu Manchu
wished for Holmes
to discover the identity of the traitor at the Empress Dowager's court.
Holmes
felt that once the solution was given, their lives would be forfeit.
Ali
al-Salaam told Holmes not to worry; he was also a spy for the British
and had
been in contact with the British Legation.
After reviewing
the
evidence and interviewing Prince Kung, the Chief Eunuch of the Palace
and the Dowager
Empress, Holmes concluded that the Empress was the traitor. Fu Manchu
refused
to believe this and would not have Holmes’ solution translated for the
Empress,
but rather told the Empress that Holmes ascertained that An
Li the Chief Eunuch was a traitor. Holmes was informed of this by Ali
al-Salaam. Al-Salaam was taken from the room by some of Fu's
soldiers for
this perfidy.
Fu believed
that Holmes had
failed to solve the puzzle properly and that a conspiracy between
Prince Kung
and An Li had existed. Fu would have sentenced Holmes and his
companions to
death, but he was interrupted by bombardment of his fortress palace. A
pile of
debris buried Fu, and his soldiers thought he was dead. Prince Kung and
a
regiment of English solders had come to rescue the English prisoners.
In 1908
Musgrave received
a letter from Holmes in which he enclosed a copy of a letter from Fu
Manchu. Fu
Manchu admitted that Holmes had been correct. The Dowager Empress had
indeed
created the secret societies and had been plotting against her own
dynasty. Fu
also took responsibility for the Boxer Rebellion; if Fu had listened to
Holmes
that tragic incident might have been avoided. He gave Holmes a major
clue to
help him create an elixir of life. This clue being that the active
ingredient
was the honey from a certain type of flower; however, Fu did not know
which
flower was needed.
Effinger copied the story, edited it, and had it
published.
It appeared as "The Adventure of the Celestial Snows,” My Sherlock
Holmes, ed. Michael Kurland, New York:
Yet the
scholar of Woldnewtonry must ask questions
about the validity of
Musgrave's accounts. Were they, as the Doyle estate and author Effinger believed, merely pastiches? Was there
any truth to
them at all? If there were some truth to them, were they two episodes
or just
one? If only one, which was the truth?
A few
months ago in
the latter part of 2003, the Musgrave family did indeed release the
pieces that
they kept as "heirlooms" on the open market. However, the book My
Sherlock Holmes had debuted a week before the sale and so the
documents
released by the Musgrave family were deemed by most to be works of
fiction by
an unpublished author. The author may have been the person upon whom
Conan
Doyle based his Reginald Musgrave character. The Musgraves
did not get their expected windfall, and the pieces ended up at the
West Sussex
Historical Society after all.
One of
the pieces
that the Musgrave family had held back was a second draft of The
Musgrave
Version in which Musgrave had added more details to his and Holmes’
trip to
This
would seem to
imply that the earlier story (“The Musgrave Version”),
despite its fantastic elements, was closer to the truth than the
second
version (“The Adventure of the Celestial Snows”).
“The
Adventure of the
Celestial Snows" reads like a pastiche of both a Holmes and a Fu Manchu
adventure, which may have been Musgrave’s intention. The depiction of
Fu Manchu
in "The Adventure of the Celestial Snows" as a very powerful and well
known, world renowned Asian villain seems to be more based on how he
was
depicted in the Rohmer novels rather than on the real Fu of 1875. In
1875 Fu's
true status and position in the Si-Fan was
rising but
not yet pre-eminent.
There was
a Lord
Mayfield associated with the British Legation in
Reginald
Musgrave had
been a college friend of Holmes at
Reginald Musgrave had been in the same college as myself, and I had some slight acquaintance with him. He was not generally popular among the undergraduates, though it always seemed to me that what was set down as pride was really an attempt to cover extreme natural diffidence. In appearance he was a man of an exceedingly aristocratic type, thin, high-nosed, and large-eyed, with languid and yet courtly manners. . . .Once or twice we drifted into talk, and I can remember that more than once he expressed a keen interest in my methods of observation and inference. [7]
Holmes’ account
of his
relationship with Musgrave does not make it appear as though they were
bosom
companions. Yet Musgrave insists that they were. It is interesting also
that
rather than blame Holmes, who related the above passage to Watson,
Musgrave
makes it appear as though Watson was putting words in Holmes’ mouth.
This
sounds as if Musgrave were jealous of Watson's relationship to Holmes,
of a
close friendship that Holmes and he truly never had. If Holmes’
statement that
Musgrave possessed "languid and courtly manners" was Holmes' tactful
manner of stating he believed Musgrave was a homosexual, then
Musgrave's
attachment to Holmes may have been for other than his stated reasons.
This may
have been one of the reasons why once they had returned to England
Holmes kept
his distance from Musgrave. "For four years I had seen nothing of him
until one morning he walked into my room in
In "The
Adventure of the Celestial Snows,” Musgrave casts himself as something
of a
hero who braved a dangerous world to rescue his friend, only to
discover that
friend, Holmes, a chained-up drug addict in the prison of an Oriental
fiend.
While it is possible that this occurred, other evidence seems to
indicate that
Musgrave memories were influenced by other factors, including wish
fulfillment.
Although
"The
Adventure of Celestial Snows" was mostly fictional, it was not entirely
fictional
and did shed some light on what transpired when Holmes and Musgrave
arrived in
A
reconstruction of
the journey that Holmes and Musgrave undertook and events that befell
them in
1875 to 1877 is still not completely possible, but a preliminary
outline can be
constructed. For our purposes, we believe that the events detailed in
the
published version of “The Musgrave Version" with its allusion of
further
events represents the basic outline of the journey Musgrave and Holmes
took
prior to ending up in
As the school
year came to
a close in 1875, Sherlock Holmes was contacted by a fellow student, a
Chinese
man by the name of Ch'ing Chuan-Fu. At
this time Ch'ing Chuan-Fu—or to use his
real name Shan Ming Fu—was a
rising prospect in the secret society known as the Sublime Order of the
White
Peacock. He had been given the delicate mission of creating an alliance
with a
brilliant but amoral Westerner whom the Sublime Order felt could be a
good ally
in their plans for
The Westerner
was James
Moriarty, to all outward appearances a professor of mathematics of good
birth
but with a tarnished reputation due to past scandals. What was not
generally
known at the time was that the professor was conversant with the
English
underworld. It was in this capacity that the Sublime Order wished to
utilize
the professor's services. Moriarty was then composing his great work The
Dynamics of an Asteroid while supplementing his income as a
consulting
criminal. In the course of his research for his mathematical paper, he
had
traveled in 1871 to
Although they
claimed the
object was worthless, the Sublime Order informed Moriarty that it had a
great
religious significance and offered to buy it for a large sum of money.
Rather
than sell it, James Moriarty proposed an alliance between the Sublime
Order and
his nascent organization, if only for purposes of intelligence and
trade.
The Sublime
Order may not
have known that James Moriarty had been recruited by the British Secret
Service
during his college days [10] or
that he was a
servant of the Nine. [11] However,
they did know
through one source that Moriarty was one of the last of the Capellean
adoptees [12]
and so may
have had access to technology not readily available to most
organizations.
The alliance
between
Moriarty’s organization and the Sublime Order was named the League of
Dragons.
This alliance
was nearly
ended as soon as it began when the brass-and-enamel box was stolen from
Shan
Ming Fu's possession. There was evidence left behind that Moriarty had
stolen
it back, yet he claimed not to have done so. Shan Ming Fu did not
believe that
Moriarty was involved, but Shan Ming Fu could not be involved in an
attempt to
retrieve the box by either his superiors or the Moriarty organization.
Shan Ming Fu
knew that he
had to retrieve the sacred object and salvage the alliance as an
obligation to
those who had entrusted him with this task. The Sublime Order had saved
him
from disgrace and humiliation when he had been dismissed from his post
as the
advisor to the Governor-General of Honan.
By 1872
Shan Ming Fu
began to realize that the Self-Strengthening Movement; Imperial China's
program
to modernize while retaining as much of the traditional culture as
possible was
doomed to fail.[13]. The imperial
government
exerted little central control and most of the actual governance,
military
commands, and financial requirements of
Shan Ming Fu
composed a
document outlining a plan to salvage the Self-Strengthening Movement
and
provide the imperial government with the wherewithal to consolidate its
power
while adhering to the principles of the Self-Strengthening Movement.
However,
the imperial government not only failed to act on his plan but the
Governor-General of Honan took offense at
the
document and had Shan Ming Fu dismissed from his service.
Shan Ming Fu
was both
humiliated and angered at his abrupt dismissal by a petty-minded
power-hungry
official. He was contacted by a member of his Tong and asked to work
directly
for them for remuneration and possible reinstatement to government
service. He
had been chosen for this task because of his recent efforts to reform
the
government. He was told he would have a bright future in the Sublime
Order of
the White Peacock.
In 1873 he was
sent to
Having
achieved a
sufficient degree of mental discipline within a year of study, Shan
Ming Fu was
judged suitable to carry out a delicate mission for the Sublime Order
of the
White Peacock.
Shan Ming Fu
had learned
of Holmes’ success in solving mysteries despite great danger, as in the
case of
the Thuggee Rathe [16]. The
matter of the
stolen brass-and-enamel box was a rather delicate one and Ch'ing
Chuan-Fu could not be seen as being directly involved. He would use
Holmes as
an unattached agent to retrieve the stolen object.
Sherlock
Holmes was
assisted by Reginald Musgrave in this investigation. Musgrave was a
passing
acquaintance who was interested in Holmes’ methods of observation and
inference. Ch'ing Chuan Fu told Holmes
that the
brass-and-enamel box was a gift from James Moriarty, but that evidence
pointed
to Moriarty as having stolen it back. Ch'ing
claimed
not to believe this and asked Holmes to try to find the whereabouts of
the
box.
After a few
weeks Musgrave
became bored with the progress of their search and went on a European
holiday
to celebrate his graduation. In the course of his investigation Holmes
became
aware that Professor James Moriarty was not the innocuous professor of
mathematics that the public believed him to be. While it was generally
known he
had a bit of a checkered past from a long forgotten sexual scandal, it
was not
generally known that the Moriarty family was deeply entrenched in
various forms
of corruption.
The
professor's uncle
Jerrold Moriarty worked with Mycroft Holmes at the Foreign Office and
he too
was corrupt. Sherlock Holmes discovered this when his investigation of
Professor
Moriarty began to coincide with his brother's investigation of the
nefarious
activities of Jerrold Moriarty. Sherlock aided his brother in this
investigation, which resulted in the suicide of Jerrold Moriarty and
the
prevention of a British-sponsored resurgence of the Confederate States
of
Sherlock
Holmes discovered
that the theft had indeed been set up to look as though agents of James
Moriarty
had stolen the brass-and-enamel box but it was another group
unconnected to
Moriarty that had stolen the box.[18]
However as
Holmes’
investigation deepened, he found that thieves of the box belonged to an
organization
run by a man named Dawkins. Dawkins had very tentative ties to the
Moriarty
organization but had his own network of thieves, which he had inherited.[19] Holmes
believed that
Moriarty had indeed arranged to have the box stolen through proxies but
had
arranged matters so that the theft would appear to be a crude frame
job.
Dawkins men had been found dead, strangled to death and stabbed
through
the heart by what appeared to be a Thuggee strangling cord and a
Cossack “kindjal” dagger.
It was not
until November
of 1875, directly after the events of Mycroft's investigation into the
Moriarty
family that a clue as to the whereabouts of Ch'ing
Chuan Fu's brass-and-enamel box turned up. It had been spotted by
Musgrave while
on holiday in
The thieves
were Russians
of both Cossack and Polish origin and two men who seemed to be Indian
origin.
Given a letter
of credit
to pursue the case, Holmes and Musgrave followed the thieves from
Holmes and
Musgrave
approached the Cossack and the Indian with an offer to buy the
brass-and-enamel
box. Holmes also expressed curiosity at their rather odd alliance.
The Cossack
answered the
second question first. They had been shipmates but had taken indefinite
shore
leave when they learned that the Tomb of Khlit
had
been violated. Khlit had been the ancestor
of the
Cossack, whose name was Andrii Bulba.
The Indian had traveled with Andrii Bulba because of the sacredness of the object
that had been
taken from Khlit's tomb.
Holmes and
Musgrave
learned of the origin of the object that they were pursing and how
Moriarty had
acquired it. The Cossack and the Indian had a special loathing for
Moriarty for
he had nearly killed them and their captain. They told Holmes a
fantastic tale,
which Musgrave at first dismissed in his memoir, of how their Captain
was
Prince Dakkar, otherwise known as Captain Nemo. In the 1860s James
Moriarty had
worked with Prince Dakkar to built two submersible vessels, the two
prototypes
for a fleet. Moriarty had sabotaged the engines of one of the vessels,
killing
most of the crew. Prince Dakkar and a few others had survived but were
sickened
nearly unto death by the fumes from fuel that drove the engine.
Moriarty had
sailed the oceans using the submersible for piracy until his poor
piloting
drove it into a maelstrom in 1868.
Andrii Bulba had
met Prince
Dakkar in 1863 during the Polish uprising against the Russians. Andrii Bulba was
the descendent
of a famed Cossack warrior Taras Bulba
through his son Andrii and a Polish woman Andrii had wed. [21]
When
Dakkar gathered a crew comprised of men fighting against oppression in
many
lands, Andrii Bulba
had
joined immediately. The Indian, Rajit Ghote, was a member of the Thuggee cult and
joined Dakkar
to ensure the freedom of his religion, which the British oppressors had
outlawed.
Erroneously
believing that
Ch'ing Chuan-Fu was an honorable man,
Holmes believed
he would not accept a gift that had been stolen. Holmes and Musgrave
agreed to
accompany Andrii Bulba
and Rajit Ghote
to
However,
neither Moriarty
nor Ch'ing Chuan-Fu wished to give
up
possession of the six rings, and at the cairn Holmes, Musgrave, Andrii Bulba, and Rajit Ghote were
set upon by two
sets of bandits—Russian thugs hired by Moriarty and a group of Mongols
hired by
Ch'ing Chuan-Fu. To elude their attackers
the men
split into two parties: Holmes and Bulba
in one party
and Musgrave and Ghote in the other.
Bulba was seriously wounded, but he and
Holmes managed to
kill off most of their attackers and scare off the rest. Holmes carried
Bulba to a village where he could be
attended and followed
the trail of Musgrave and Ghote. Amidst
signs of a
great struggle he found Ghote's bloody,
frozen body,
a note pinned to his chest by a knife. In English it read "Please visit
me
in
Holmes
traveled to
Shan Lan Fo was then in upper
Holmes was led
to a
basement where an abandoned dungeon had been fitted with new, modern
manacles
and chains. Chained to the wall was a dirty unkempt figure wearing a
fleece
lined coat. It was Reginald Musgrave who
had been kept
on a starvation diet. [24]
When Shan Ming
Fu asked
for the rings of Di-Cang, Holmes knew what
Shan Ming
Fu was talking about. Shan Ming Fu informed Holmes that Musgrave had
already
been tortured and had revealed what they knew of the rings of Di-Cang. Holmes believed that the object of six
interlocked
rings was a representation of the rings of Di-Cang.
Di-Cang was one of the four great
bodhisattvas of Chinese
mythology. Di-Cang was often depicted as a
monk
carrying a metal staff with six jingling rings on it in his right hand,
which
he uses to open the gates of the various hells and liberate the damned.[25]
Shan Ming Fu
told Holmes
that his deduction was correct but that these rings were the real thing
and
when connected to the staff of Di-cang,
they could
open the gates of hell and raise the dead.
Fu wished for
Homes to
give him the rings. Holmes did not have them on his person and
told Shan
Ming Fu that they had been put back in the cairn of Khlit.
Shan Ming Fu did not believe this and attempted to get the answer from
him by
various physical and psychological tortures, including starvation,
drugging,
the water torture, and being placed in a room with hungry rats.
Shan Ming Fu
stated that
they would subject Reginald Musgrave to the death of a thousand cuts if
Holmes
did not give the rings over. Fu rejected that Holmes’ suggestion that
Holmes
should be allowed to leave and retrieve the object. He believed that
Holmes
would escape and inform the British authorities. Fu told Holmes to
write a note
to one of the members of the British legation with whom he had met and
ask him
to bring the rings to Fu's house. Taking the note was a trusted servant
of Fu,
Ali al-Salaam. He returned with Willard Powers of the British Legation
who gave
the rings to Holmes who then handed them over to Fu. Ali al-Salaam
revealed to
Holmes that he was also a spy for the British and that he was keeping
the
British Legation well apprised of their situation. The British were,
however,
loathe to interfere and set off another
conflict
between
Fu, however,
told Holmes
he had one more task for Holmes to perform before he could regain his
freedom.
As related in “The Adventure of the Celestial Snows" Fu wished to use
Holmes’ deductive reasoning and objective viewpoint to examine who
might be a
traitor, plotting to overthrow Ch'ing
Dynasty and
working with the British.
The exact
circumstances
are unknown, but apparently Holmes did indeed conduct translated
interviews
with members of the imperial court, including Prince Kung, Empress Tzu Hsi, An Li the Chief Eunuch, and a few others.
After the
interview process, Holmes came to the conclusion that the Empress Tzu Hsi was going to betray her dynasty, was working
with
secret societies in
Holmes was
informed of
these events by Ali al-Salaam, who was angrily sentenced to death by
Fu. Ali
al-Salaam was dragged out of the room to his certain doom.[26]
However, the
Dowager
Empress was known by those close to the court to be personally power
hungry and
yet self-destructive when it came to her dynasty. Personal power was
all that
mattered to her without a great deal of dynastic foresight. She
dominated her
son during her time as his regent. By the time he came of age and
became the
Emperor, his mother's reign had come to an end. To keep her power she
selected
a wife and four concubines for him, to keep him so busy that she could
rule for
him. After a few years, the emperor died of venereal disease in January
1875
and Tzu Hsi became ruler once again.
However, the
Empress still was not totally free to rule, for her son's favorite
concubine
was pregnant and if she delivered a boy, the boy would be the new
emperor and
his mother the dowager empress. She would not let this happen, so
mysteriously
the concubine died before giving birth. Many historians conjecture that
this
was done at the request of Tzu-Hsi. Other
historians
simply believe that the concubine was mentally unstable and this caused
her to
take her own life. With the death of her son and his pregnant
concubine, the
Dowager Empress had her three-year-old nephew, Kuang
Hsu, who was not in direct line of succession to the throne, named as
the next
heir emperor with her as his regent.
Although the
Dowager
Empress' direct power was concentrated in an area near the
It is likely
that the
Sublime Order of the White Peacock were quite aware of the Empress
Dowager's
avaricious and duplicitous nature and hoped to exploit it by using her
has a
figurehead. Yet they needed to discover people who were close to the
Empress
and would actively try to thwart their efforts to revitalize
When the
imperial party
had departed from Shan Lan
Fo's home and Shan Ming Fu was alone with
his two
prisoners, he told them that unfortunately they now knew too much and
would
have to be eliminated.
Just then, an
explosion
rocked the prison and debris from the ceiling collapsed onto Shan Ming
Fu, who
was buried beneath the rubble. They saw that Fu was not dead but did
not feel
constrained to aid him. Holmes and Musgrave made their way clear of the
prison.
Holmes and Musgrave stopped to retrieve the six rings of Di-Cang
from where Shan Ming Fu had secreted them. Holmes did not believe that
the
rings were an actual divine object, but concluded that Moriarty or the
treacherous Ch'ing Chuan-Fu could use them
to rally
opposition to the
Holmes and
Musgrave were
discovered by a joint force of Chinese and British soldiers led by
Prince Kung
and Lord Mayfield. Lord Mayfield died of a heart attack as they were
exiting
the house of Shan Lan
Fo. [28]
Knowing that
Shan Ming Fu
was still alive, Holmes felt that it was best that they leave China as
soon as
possible despite the British Legation's promise to keep them safe from
retaliation from Shan Ming Fu.
Holmes and
Musgrave had
only traveled as far as Toku before they
were set
upon by agents of Ch'ing Chuan-Fu. They
were rescued
by a dead man, at least one thought to be dead by the world.
Their
rescuer was Prince Dakkar, otherwise known as Captain Nemo,
thought to
have died in 1869.[29] Nemo took
Holmes and
Musgrave aboard the Nautilus.
Nemo had known
that Andrii Bulba
had gone to rectify
Moriarty's violation of Khlit's tomb.
Although Nemo
did not care that much about Khlit or the
desecration
of his tomb, he was enthusiastic about getting even with Moriarty and
so aided
his Russian crewmember in retrieving the object. When Nemo learned of
the
possible alliance between Moriarty and the Sublime Order of the White
Peacock,
he used all possible means to break this alliance.
Moriarty had
stolen one of
his submarines, destroyed the plans, and left Nemo for dead from
radiation
poisoning. He had then used Nemo's name and ruined his reputation.[30] Nemo also
wished to
work against the Sublime Order because its allies had betrayed him by
inducing
Dakkar to turn against the Nine Unknown and the Capelleans and then
abandoned
him, having no intention of supporting his idealistic crusade against
war.
Andrii Bulba had
sent a message
to his captain about Holmes’ trip to
Nemo had the
brass-and-enamel box containing the rings of Di-cang
flushed through the exhaust pipe of the Nautilus and onto the ocean's
floor
rather than let either Ch'ing Chuan-Fu or
Moriarty
ever have the chance of regaining it.
When the
Nautilus surfaced
to take supplies from a tropical island, Nemo insisted that Holmes and
Musgrave
take the chance to stretch their legs. Nemo marooned them on this
island so
that they could not tell the world that Captain Nemo and the Nautilus
still
existed. Rather than killing them outright, he marooned them on
Noble’s
Nemo was
unaware that
someone else had taken up residence on the island, this person being
Dr.
Moreau. Dr. Moreau was at this time in the early stages of his vivisectional and transmutational
experiments to evolve animals into humanoid form. One of his first
successes
was to increase the size and intelligence of a rat and give it a form
roughly
akin to an anthropoid ape. He tried to pass these experiments off as a
species
of giant rat from
Moreau was
anxious for his
unwelcome visitors to be on their way so he could return to his serious
research. Holmes and Musgrave were also anxious to return to
Musgrave and
Holmes needed
money to finance their passage back home. Using the name William Escott, Holmes became an actor working in a
company engaged
at the Orpheum theatre and other theaters in
One of the
actors in
Holmes’ company became distraught because he had learned that his
paramour had
died from opium poisoning. Although she was a Chinese girl working in a
parlor
house, he had truly loved her and wanted to buy her from her master.
However,
her master had kept upping the price and dangled her forever out of his
reach.
Escott asked to accompany the young actor to
the mortuary
where he examined the body. He found that she had been strangled to
death. The
first suspect was the master of the girl, but this theory proved to be
incorrect; the girl had continued to be a good money maker for him so
she was a
valuable commodity rather than a liability at that point. As it turned
out the
actual murderer was the actor's brother, who believed that the girl had
bewitched his brother and was ruining his life. The police declined to
charge
him with murder since the victim was Chinese. [34]
Escott was approached by two Chinese
merchants, who asked
him to investigate the delicate matter of the death of Jeanne Bonnet,
also
known as Little Frog Catcher. Bonnet had been found dead in her shack.
Bonnet
was an odd figure even for
This all came
to an end
when Jeanne Bonnet was found dead with a bullet in her heart. Most
people, including
the police, believed that she had been killed by one of the procurers
whose
girls she had rescued. However, because of her background the police
did not
care to investigate this crime.
Some
anti-Chinese elements
were, however, starting rumors that a Chinaman had killed Jeanne and
trying to
make her into a tragic figure so that they could whip up more
anti-Chinese
sentiment. Since Escott had
attempted to get
justice for Chuan Jing Jia,
the murdered Chinese prostitute, the Chinese merchants wondered if he
might
take this case.
Holmes took
the case and
quickly ascertained that the police were in essence correct that the
procurers
had arranged to have Jeanne killed. There were also Chinese persons
involved,
but the ulterior motive for the crime had been one of the oldest
motives in the
world, jealousy. Jeanne had fallen in love with a girl who had recently
joined
her coterie, a Chinese girl. This did not set too well with Jeanne's
lover,
Blanche Buneau. In a jealous rage she had
accepted
the procurer's contract on Jeanne and killed her.[35]
William Escott was seen performing in the Orpheum and
was offered a
part in a
While enroute
to
However
despite what
Musgrave stated in his memoirs, they had no foreknowledge of the
impending
massacre nor did they race to attempt to stop it.
As a school
mate Reginald
Musgrave was suitable acquaintance to Holmes, but as a traveling
companion he
left much to be desired. After Escott's
turn on the
Although they
were not
truly all that close, Holmes did correspond sporadically with Musgrave.
The
last occasion seems to have been in 1908 when Holmes related the letter
he had
received from Shan Ming Fu, now calling himself Fu Manchu. Fu Manchu
had
congratulated Holmes on the accuracy of his deduction concerning the
Empress.
Fu Manchu told Holmes that if he had not been so blind that the Boxer
Rebellion
could have been avoided. As recompense Fu Manchu offered Holmes clues
to an elixir
of youth, the key ingredient was honey made from a certain flower.
The aim of the
Boxer
Rebellion was to be the vanguard of the military expulsion of Europeans
from
Realizing that
The Sublime
Order of the
White Peacock and Shan Ming Fu probably supported the Emperor's
reforms, but
after the Dowager Empress once again took control they lent support to
the
Boxers, realizing that win or lose the rebellion would probably bring
about the
end of the Ch'ing dynasty. However, the
Dowager
Empress survived the aftermath of the rebellion and held onto her
power.
1908 was a
very
interesting year for Fu Manchu to have written this letter to Sherlock
Holmes.
In 1908 the Emperor Kuang-hsü died. The
Dowager
Empress chose the Emperor's nephew, P'u
Yi, to
succeed him, giving her yet another child to be regent over. But
she died
on the same day as P'u Yi was installed. P'u Yi was the last Emperor of China and the
last of the
Dowager Empress dynasty.
1908 is also,
according to
some sources, the year that Shan Ming Fu stopped used his temporary
identity as
Hanoi Shan and began using Fu Manchu, the name by which he would be
most known.
Hanoi Shan was, according to the true-crime accounts of H.
Ashton-Wolfe, in Warped
in the Making and The Thrill of Evil, a criminal mastermind
of Asian
origin. [38]
Fu Manchu's
purpose in
giving Holmes the clue about the missing ingredient of the Elixir of
Life may
not have been entirely altruistic. Fu Manchu may have known that Holmes
would
pursue the clue of the bees and save him time and trouble in research.
He may
have reasoned that he could always steal the formula later.
When Sherlock
Holmes
interfered with Fu Manchu's plans in the winter of 1914, the fact that
Holmes
was still working on the elixir and close to discovering the secret was
probably one of the reasons that Fu Manchu spared his life.[39]
This
information from the
Musgrave papers brings up the question of why Fu Manchu did not use
Holmes’
royal jelly formula, which was completed in 1921. Instead Fu Manchu had
to
create his own Elixir of Life in 1929. [40]
The answer
seems to be that Fu Manchu had an allergic reaction to the royal jelly
that
would have killed him; it took him eight years to create a derivation
that
would work on him. As it turned out this derivation was better for it
restored
youth as well as prolonged life. However, the dosage was higher and it
had to
be taken more often to maintain a youthful age.
Dr. Fu Manchu's
clue to
Sherlock Holmes, whatever the reason it was given, would turn out to be
a
two-edged sword. While it enabled Fu Manchu to create his elixir of
youth,
allowing him to live on and continue his struggle against Western
imperialism,
it also allowed his enemies to remain youthful and continue to oppose
him, such
as Sherlock Holmes, Mycroft Holmes, James Bond, Dennis Nayland
Smith, and Dr. Petrie.
Shan Ming Fu
never forgave
James Moriarty's betrayal of him, taking it as personal affront that he
had
stolen back the brass-and-enamel box. He blamed Moriarty for his loss
of face
within the Sublime Order. In 1898 Shan Ming Fu was in
Shan Ming
Fu stole
the substance—called cavorite after its
discoverer—and planned to use it to build a dreadnought that would
devastate
[1] Hughes, Algernon, "Old
Documents
Found In Soon To Be Home For The Aged"
[2] Civil
Court Records
of
[3] Effinger,
George Alec. "The Musgrave Version." Sherlock Holmes in Orbit. Ed.
Michael Resnick.
[4] The Musgrave Ritual actually took place early in Holmes career as a consulting detective, prior to Holmes having met Watson. The events and all its pertinent details, including the description of Musgrave were recounted to Watson by Holmes. Musgrave conveniently overlooked that when he made Watson the scapegoat for his portrayal.
[5] The use of this device is intriguing in itself because one has to wonder if Fu Manchu actually had such a gas-filled glass ball, although Rohmer did not mention it so far as I recall. If Fu Manchu did have such a device then he anticipated Doc Savage by some fifty-five years or so. If Fu Manchu did not possess such a device, one wonders where Musgrave came up with the notion. Is it possible that he later witnessed an early unrecorded adventure of Doc Savage's in which the glass ball was used and inserted its use into his record of this adventure? The Musgrave papers so far examined contain no mention of such an adventure, even one that might have been transmogrified into Sherlock Holmes adventure. One is led to suspect Effinger’s hand.
[6] His grandson, Nigel, would later become one of the pre-eminent agents of the British Secret Service.
[7] Doyle,
Arthur Conan. "The Musgrave Ritual." The
[8] Doyle, “The Musgrave Ritual,”
[9] It was
during this period that
Moriarty impregnated a Russian woman, who gave birth to the child who
would
eventually be known as Grigori Rasputin.
That
Rasputin was the son of Moriarty was established in John T. Lescroart’s
Rasputin's Revenge,
[10] Moore, Alan,
and Kevin O’Neill. The League of
Extraordinary Gentlemen, Volume 1, No. 5.
[11] As
established in Philip José Farmer’s Lord of the Trees,
[12] As
established in Philip José
Farmer’s The Other Log of
[13] For more on the Self-Strengthening movement see http://reference.allrefer.com/country-guide-study/china/china27.html or http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~dee/CHING/SELF.HTM
[14] Rache Churan appeared in The Hand of Fu Manchu, Chapter 28.
[15] That Fu Manchu and Fo-Hi were both members of the same tong—called the Sublime Order of the White
Peacock—was established by Rick Lai in “The Brotherhood of the Lotus,” Nemesis Incorporated, No. 28, December, 1988.
[16] For more information see Rick Lai’s The Secret History of Captain Nemo and the film Young Sherlock Holmes .
[17] Hodel,
Michael P. and Wright, Sean M. Enter the Lion, Playboy Press:
[18] Many of the revelations about this case are new since the Musgrave estate only allowed George Alec Effinger to publish teasers from the memoirs of Reginald Musgrave, intending to publish the entire memoirs themselves. However, problems with the estate of Watson’'s agent have placed that particular publication on indefinite hold. Therefore they kindly allowed me to share some more of the information in the memoirs.
[19] Dawkins was a protégé of Fagin, and as a child Dawkins had been known as the Artful Dodger as seen in Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist.
[20] Unfortunately Musgrave never wrote the specifics of how he had spotted the brass-and-enamel box or even how he recognized it as the one belonging to Ch'ing Chuan-Fu. One clue among the effects in the Musgrave effects was a brass token stamped with the words Joyeux Nuits espionner trouer. This seems to be a token a French brothel, The Nights of Joy. The phrase espionner trouer seems to refer to spy room or peephole room, which was hidden hallway equipped with spy holes through which customers could pay to watch what was transpiring in the various rooms. It is possible that Musgrave paid for such a service and saw the box and or overheard conversation about it.
[21] See Taras Bulba by Nicolai Golgol.
[22] Khlit the Wolf was a Cossack active through the 16th century. He had once rescued the Chinese emperor from treasonous imprisonment, and at that time was given or otherwise acquired this artifact. His life was documented by Harold Lamb in various short stories appearing in Adventure magazine. For more information, see “Khlit” in Jess Nevins’ The Pulp Heroes <http://www.geocities.com/jjnevins/pulpsk.html>.
[23] Shan Lan Fo may have been depicted in August Derleth's "The Lair of the Star-Spawn" as Dr. Fo Lan. For his relationship to Shan Ming Fu please see Rick Lai's Fu Manchu Vs. Cthulhu.
[24] This is quite the reverse of what Musgrave claimed in his account "The Adventure of the Celestial Snows."
[25] Di-Cang entry, Knappert, Jan. The Encyclopedia of Middle Eastern Mythology & Religion, Shaftesbury: Element, 1993
[26] Holmes would later learn that Ali al-Salaam had not been keeping the British Legation apprised of Holmes’ and Musgrave's captivity. Ali al-Salaam was not a servant of Shan Ming Fu but rather one of his mentors. He was also known as Rashiel the advisor to the Wadi (Leader) of the Assassins. For more information see my articles “The Demon: Skull Face, Lord of the Dark Face” and “The Devil Doctor.” Although the Wadis came and went, Rashiel remained. The combined assault of British and Chinese troops on Shan Ming Fu's headquarters at this crucial moment seems to have been an exceedingly fortunate turn of events for Holmes and Musgrave. So fortunate in fact, it is quite likely that it was pre-arranged by Shan Ming Fu and Ali al-Salaam to give verisimilitude to the story he had woven for the Dowager Empress.
[27] Empress Dowager Tzu Hsii <http://www.royalty.nu/Asia/China/TzuHsi.html>
[28] In "The Adventure of the Celestial Snows,” Musgrave makes it appears as though Mayfield had a personal confrontation with Fu Manchu, his archenemy of many years, and that Mayfield was overpowered and killed by Fu Manchu. As shown earlier in 1875 Fu Manchu was not that well known, outside of certain circles so Lord Mayfield probably had only scant knowledge of him, if any.
[29] As depicted in Jules Verne's The Mysterious Island.
[30] For a fuller version of this clash between Moriarty and Nemo, please see Rick Lai's The Secret History of Captain Nemo.
[31] Ali al-Salaam or Rashiel was playing an even larger game than perhaps even Shan Ming Fu knew for he had also kept in contact with Prince Dakkar, one of James Moriarty's mortal enemies.
[32] Musgrave's allusion
to one to
the Giant Rat of Sumatra is just one of many such that exist in the
canon of Holmesian literature. In "The
Adventure of the Sussex
Vampire,” Holmes made an allusion to an unpublished adventure of his:
"Matilda Briggs was not the name of a young woman, Watson," said
Holmes in a reminiscent voice. "It was a ship which is associated with
the
giant rat of
[33] Moreau's next visitor, some years later, would be Edward Prendrick, as depicted in The Island of Dr. Moreau by H.G. Wells.
[34] So far as we can
ascertain, record of this murder
investigation by Holmes only exists in
the memoirs of Reginald Musgrave. The
[35] Musgrave's description of Jeanne Bonnet's life as a cross-dressing lesbian, her career as a gang leader of women, and her odd death are supported by historical facts; however, Holmes involvement in the investigation of her death and his solution to the crime cannot be verified by outside sources.
[36] There
are also legends surrounding
the Battle of Little Big Horn that the Sioux and
[37] As seen in Sherlock Holmes and the Hands of Othello by Alexander Simmons.
[38] Ashton-Wolfe, H. Warped
in the
Making
[39] Cay Van Ash, Ten
Years
[40] One wonders why Fu Manchu was not approached by the Nine to join them. As it turns out he had been approached early in his career but did not wish to be bound to any organization whose goals would not necessarily coincide with his. He also feared that the Nine's elixir was addictive and once someone joined they could not leave the group.
[41] Moore, Alan, and
Kevin O’Neill. The League of
Extraordinary
Gentlemen, Volume 1, No. 5.