Sherlock Holmes had been dead almost eight years when he was discovered near the Baskerville estate in the bleak Dartmoor highlands. Hidden beneath the black tor and  camped in the neolitic ruins of an ancient home, he continued the investigation of the late Baron’s fallen body and, near the spot of the crime, “the footprints of a gigantic hound”.

The world’s first consulting detective, the coldly cerebral and daringly deductive Sherlock Holmes, was first spied in 1887 in the company of his friend and narrator, Dr. John H. Watson. Their first adventure was a longish short story entitled by the publishers “A Study in Scarlet.” A 28-year-old storytelling physician by the name of Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle had glimpsed the antics of the brilliant Holmes and the bumbling Watson. Conan Doyle proceeded to place the two on paper to the endearment of a growing and devoted audience of fans. Through the second Holmes story, “The Sign of Four,” published in 1890, and twelve more episodes of incisive intrigue and reasoned revelation, released between 1891 and 1892 and compiled in “The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes,” Dr. Doyle chronicled the growing success of the secretive sleuth and his steady sidekick.

Of that success, Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle became jealous.

The observing physician with the quick pen confided that it was he who had first brought the stories to popular attention, and he, Arthur Conan Doyle, never thought much of the condescending Holmes. The detective was always showing off and acting so smart. What did Holmes know? Arthur Conan Doyle was just as smart — just you wait and see. Conan Doyle wrote his mother that he was thinking of doing to Sherlock Holmes what the insufferable detective deserved.

“The game is afoot,” and the criminal perpetrator is none other than the author himself.

In December of 1893, Arthur Conan Doyle killed Sherlock Holmes.

It was at the top of Reichenbach Falls in Switzerland, in the story entitled “The Final Problem.” Holmes is struggling with his archenemy, the master criminal Professor Moriarty, whom he has tracked down and trapped. Justice is about to be done . . . evil defeated. The determined detective is prevailing. When . . . someone rushes from the dark at the two grappling figures and pushes them both over the precipice to the sharp rocks and crashing waters below.

The public outcry was deafening.

How could you!!!

Conan Doyle sat back, counted his money and threw the letters from the Holmesian fans into the trash.

Eight years passed. Our scrivener physician had written many other books and stories. They and he had been somewhat successful. Still, the public was clamoring for more Holmes and Watson.

“What is it about those two?” Conan Doyle thought to himself. “Oh well, a little extra cash won’t hurt. There is that ‘real creeper.’ I never shared the story with anyone. Let me remember . . . it occurred back in 1889, four years before Holmes fell from the falls. I see it now. Holmes was asked to advise on the ‘curse of the Baskervilles.’ What a tale that is. As I recall, there was ‘a great, black beast, shaped like a hound, yet larger than any mortal eye ever rested upon,’ with ‘blazing eyes and dripping jaws.’ That is a good one. It’ll get the public off my back and I’ll make a bundle while I’m at it.”

And so, in August of 1901, the first installment of “The Hound of the Baskervilles” was published.

The public and the King loved it.

A year later in 1902, Conan Doyle was knighted “Sir” Arthur Conan Doyle by King Edward. After the ceremony, pulling the now middle-aged and rounding physician aside, the King winked and encouraged his newly dubbed vassal to investigate what really had happened back in 1893 at Reichenbach Falls. Was the chronicler certain the secretive Holmes had not survived and was avoiding the public gaze?

Did the King know something the man of letters did not?

When the King asks, it is best for a new knight to go on the quest.

The new Sir Arthur recalled that, in the excitement, he had not walked to the edge of the cliff and looked down to see what had happened to the detective.

A year later, in 1903, in the new story “The Adventure of the Empty House,” the knighted investigator revealed, to the King, the Nation and the World, that Sherlock Holmes had, in fact, survived the fall at Reichenbach Falls.

The slippery sleuth was back in business with the trusty doctor at his side.

True to his words, Conan Doyle followed with three more collections of stories and another novel, “The Valley of Fear,” all featuring Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson. Unfortunately, a rift had developed between the writer and his leading character. The new post-fall works had lost something. Perhaps, the reclusive Holmes was not as willing to share with his watcher, the writer. Attempted murder is a serious matter, and it may cool even a close relationship. Miffed by his death and literary exile, the more entertaining episodes of unraveled fact in subsequent stories may have been kept by the detective for a more worthy observer. Such is the reader’s loss when a writer and his protagonist part ways.

We can be thankful that before the rift became severe, “The Hound of the Baskervilles” was resurrected and published intact. The work has been called “the most famous mystery novel in literary history” — a tribute that echoes true and far in both sound and sight. The story on the moors of Dartmoor has been filmed twenty times and more. It loses nothing in the retelling and gains much in the rereading. If you haven’t, please consider a read. You will not be disappointed with your new acquaintances. And, if you have, consider another. Old friends are the best and can be even more surprising when revisited.

Some would say that a good story never really ends, despite the odds.

I wonder how Professor Moriarty feels after his fall?

Stay tuned for more,

Grandpa Jim