Watson's Folly: Sherlock Holmes Meets . . . . by DanielSan59 I must relate to this my diary a most peculiar occurrence, for the very oddity of it precludes any mention of it in my correspondence to The Strand. It was the morning after the Augustus Milverton debacle and I still felt soiled by the whole sordid affair. I had convinced Holmes to accompany on a small excursion to the countryside just outside London to take solace in the purity of Nature. We came upon a small quiet woodland and began strolling down a game trail. The air was brisk, the glazing of frost heavy on the ground. I glanced at Holmes as he strode beside me. He was in rare form this morning; he strode along quite vigorously, his slender frame practically bursting with vigour as he stabbed his cane into the ground with each stride. Normally he would have decried this exercise as a waste of his precious time, but I do believe he was actually enjoying himself. His eyes darted about continuously as he traveled and I wondered what the world was revealing to his prodigious talents of observation. He had gradually pulled slightly ahead of me and was a few steps away when he abruptly stopped and held up a hand to still my forward motion. "Hello, what have we here?" His head quickly turned to either side of the path and then he motioned me forward as he crouched near the ground. He then pulled out his magnifying lens and called to me, "Watson, examine the ground before me and inform what you make of this unusual marking. Your stint in India and the Orient might assist me this fine morning." There in the midst of the path was a most oddly shaped impression approximately four inches in diameter and somewhat spiral shaped with the center of the impression being perhaps two inches deep. The impression was slightly inclined upward towards the right side of the path, indicating the main force of the impact came from that side. I glanced to the left and was rewarded by a series of similar singular impressions proceeding in a generally straight line some six to eight feet apart. I had traveled widely in my days in His Majesty's Army but this was quite beyond my experience. "Holmes, this appears to be a track of some sort, although I have never seen its like before. It most closely resembles that of the kanga-roo of Australia, which stands upright on two feet and takes great springing strides as its means of locomotion. But the tracks of the kanga-roo leave two impressions side-by-side and with clear evidence of toes and claws. This has neither." "Quite so, Watson, quite so. A strange find indeed. The depth of the impressions indicate the mass of whatever made them was between one and two stones; some twenty-five or thirty pounds. The tracks are quite recent, within the last five minutes, as the grass alongside the path has not yet recovered from the impacts. At first I thought this the work of some mechanical contrivance, but closer examination revealed traces of this in the depression." He held before my eyes the magnifying glass and something caught in the grip of a small pair of tweezers. It was hair or fur of some sort, short and coloured orange and black. Holmes spoke again. "I should have to get this back to Baker Street and my microscope for a more definitive answer, but I believe this is the fur of an animal in the genus Felis, to whit, Watson, a cat." With that utterance he arose and exclaimed his usual exhortation in this type of situation: "Come Watson, the game's afoot!" followed closely by, "And I feared this was just another exercise to humor your concern over my health. Hah!" He stalked rapidly away, following the tracks. Humoring me, indeed! The nerve of the man, after all the years I'd spent with him, his disappearance and supposed death, his damnable custom of imbibing cocaine. Of course I was concerned with his health! I am his physician and friend after all. "Watson, what's keeping you man! The trail grows cold while you dawdle!" I hurried to catch up and was soon striding once again beside him. This was not over. He and I were much overdue for a long conversation about his habits. We followed the trail deeper into the small woodlot, the tracks becoming fresh. We were closing fast upon their mysterious source. After a few minutes Holmes halted, his head cocked to one side. He grabbed my arm and pulled me quickly to one side of the path. "Holmes, what on earth..." "Be still, Watson, and listen!" he whispered urgently. I bent my ear to the wind and began to hear a strange sound being repeated nearly every two seconds and growing rapidly louder. The best verbalization I can make of it is "BOING!" It was interspersed at odd intervals with some sort of bird-like call. For the life of me, I could not tell which direction the sounds were coming from. The lay of the land and the shifting breezes prevented it. I was just turning to ask Holmes of it when a black and orange streak impacted my chest with sufficient force to send me sprawling onto my back. The impact took my breath away and my eyes winced shut at the unexpected blow. When I opened them again it was to confront the fuzzy visage of what I took to be a small tiger. I immediately froze as it's mouth opened, but instead of the expected coughing roar there was a chuckling laugh followed by a bellowed "HELLO, Neighbor!!" "Egad! It speaks! A talking tiger!" uttered an astonished Holmes. "Of course I speak! Speaking's what Tiggers do best! And that's not Tiger, it's Tigger. T-I-double G- ERR. That spells Tigger!" the odd creature exclaimed as it sat up on my chest. "And what, pray tell, is a Tigger?" Holmes inquired politely, upon which the little blighter launched into this vulgar little song from his perch on my chest. I don't recall the wording of the entire song but it ended thus: "But the most wonderful thing about Tiggers, is I'm the only one!" A statement to which I most emphatically agreed, even to this day. "HOLMES!! Get this beastly little rotter off of me!!" I shouted as soon as the little monster ceased his caterwauling. Before he could move the creature spoke again. "Well, gotta run! Nice bumping into you, but there's this grumpy old rabbit that's overdue for a good pouncin' and there's this story I've been writing on that I just have to finish. After all, writin's what Tiggers do best! TTFN... Ta Ta For Now! Hoo hoo hoo hoo!" With that the bugger leaped off my chest and coiled its tail for all the world like a glorified spring and BOUNCED off down the trail, leaving the two of us gawking after it like amazed children. Holmes shook his head in perplexity and offered me his hand. "A most unique creature with an unusual method of propulsion, was it not, my dear Watson?" he asked as he assisted me to my feet. I was so outraged by the entire affair that I could do little more than sputter uselessly. Holmes brushed the forest detritus from my coat and guided me back the way we came. "So, Watson, shall you be reporting this little incident to the Strand as in some of my previous exploits?" Holmes asked me with a sardonic grin. "Publish this?! I'd be the laughingstock of all England! Downed by a fuzzy orange creature that talks and bounces on its tail to get around? I most assuredly will NOT!" I replied quite heatedly. "They wouldn't believe a word of it. By Jove, I don't believe it and it happened to me. Perhaps there was some strange substance in the air causing us both to suffer a sort of grand delusion." "I think not, old man. If you will observe, the proof is right there on your very breast." Holmes replied. I looked down and on my chest were four quite distinct, muddy paw prints. And then, to my great surprise and chagrin, the Great Detective, a dour man at best, broke out in loud peals of laughter. "Oh, Watson, old man, you should have been able to observe your own visage when the 'Tigger' as he called himself, began his little ditty upon your chest. Priceless, truly priceless." When Holmes had finally regained his composure as I grumbled along beside him, he turned to me. "Watson, I should be most obliged if you would add this little encounter to your private memoirs of our adventures together. I would not forget this little mystery in the press of days to come." And so, I am setting this down in print, and having done so, I will never peruse it again. My embarrassment over the entire encounter is simply too keen. Thus, I have appropriately named it "Watson's Folly." Finis