The Consulting Detective Trilogy Part II: On Stage

by Darlene A. Cypser

Disowned by his father and sent down by his college, a penniless Sherlock Holmes seeks refuge with his brother Mycroft in London. Soon a fellow student introduces him to a mysterious world of magic and deception which will teach him skills he will use throughout his detective career -- the world of the theater. Kidnappers and a murderous attack at the stage door in London, police corruption in New York, train robbers in Nebraska, and hoodlums and shanghaiers in San Francisco are among the many challenges young Sherlock Holmes faces.

Genres: Mystery Thriller

288 pages, Paperback

First published June 6, 2017

About the author

Darlene Cypser is a writer, attorney, and historian.

She was the "Chief Surgeon" of Dr. Watson's Neglected Patients for over a decade and also a member of the Hudson Valley Sciontists, and The Hounds of the Internet. The Baker Street Journal (the official publication of the Baker Street Irregulars) published three articles that she wrote about the Sherlock Holmes stories.

Darlene is writing a series of biographical novels about Sherlock Holmes. She has also written four Sherlock Holmes short stories.

She is writing several non-fiction history books about the history of the American West.

Darlene's first fiction story to be published was a ghost story that appeared in the Boulder Daily Camera in October 1992.

She has written number of papers and articles which were published in magazines and professional legal and scientific journals on international space law, liability for induced seismicity, landlord and tenant law, intellectual property law, tax law and motion picture production and distribution.

Darlene loves reading and writing about history, science and law, as well as fiction. She also enjoys hiking, cooking and photography.

Reviews

[Leah · Rating 4 out of 5]

When we left the young Sherlock Holmes at the end of University, he had just left Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, under a literal cloud, his name stricken from the rolls. Now he’s back in London, having broken into Mycroft’s flat; estranged from his father in Yorkshire, he has nowhere else to go. After some rest, a trip to the Turkish baths in St. Jermyn Street, and a discussion with a very patient Mycroft, he decides, however, that it’s for the best. If he wants to be a consulting detective, he’s got to look elsewhere for his education; the university has nothing more to teach him.

Sidney Sussex is still very much a part of his life, however; he owes them big £££ for the “incident.” And as he is no longer being supported by his father (and doesn’t want Squire Holmes to know about the debt) he needs to find a job–quickly. This isn’t easy, but fortunately he runs into another disgraced (and former) Cantabrigian, his one-time nemesis, Lord Cecil. Much as the people you disliked (and for whom the feeling was mutual) in high school seem so much nicer once you’ve graduated, Cecil and Holmes begin a wary friendship. It turns out they have something in common–disappointed fathers–and the young nobleman also has a suggestion for an intriguing job.

Lord Cecil has become an actor with the Corycian Company (managed by the rather exotic and mysterious Michael Sassanoff), taking the stage name, “Langdale Pike.” Holmes quickly sees the potential acting has, not just for clearing his debt, but for his long-term career goals. A good detective should, after all, know the art of disguise, and as an actor he’ll definitely learn the art of transforming himself into all sorts of people. As we know from a future friend and colleague that “the stage lost a fine actor….” when Sherlock Holmes became a detective, he gets the job and soon has his own stage name–“William Escott.”

Quite a few people have these “stop-gap” jobs–positions they take until they find a foothold in the career they trained for. I was a telemarketer, for instance. And a data entry clerk. And a historical re-enactor. And a secretary. And a cashier. And…well, you get the picture. But in all of those jobs, I went to work (and to work again), ran errands, went home, then repeated it all the next day. There was an occasional disgruntled customer, lost message and, once, an abusive boss, but in general my dramas were fairly low-key. I never travelled to another country. I never had to rescue children. I may have had a nervous breakdown, but it wasn’t on stage in front of God and Everybody. My love life wasn’t so horrid as to cause me to swear off romance forever, none of my workplaces were cursed, I never went undercover and, most certainly, no one tried to kill me once, let alone twice.

Yup, twice. And as the saying goes, “Once is an accident, twice is a coincidence….”

Obviously, the young Sherlock Holmes experiences all of these things–and quite a bit more. Not all of it is exciting–Holmes does a lot of traveling, line-memorizing, and reading about crime in the papers–but that’s what I think makes Cypser’s books stand out. There are quite a few “young Sherlock Holmes” books out there–I’ve reviewed several of them, and they often tend towards the fantastic–like a Victorian Harry Potter, without wands. I’m not saying this is bad, necessarily–I am still hoping Andrew Lang has a few more waiting in his brain-attic, actually–but it is very evident that these are “stories” in every sense of the word. A friend and I have often discussed why we like the “Consulting Detective” series so much, and I think it comes down to two things in particular: a relatable Sherlock Holmes and the fact that it isn’t a story–it’s a biography.

Let’s examine the first, for a moment. I admit, when I read (and re-read) The Crack in the Lens, I did feel that teen Sherlock was a bit…melodramatic. But was he, really? He had suffered an unbelievable loss, lacked the parental support that would perhaps have allowed him to emerge stronger–let’s be honest, as helpful as Mycroft and Sherrinford tried to be, they were young and inexperienced–and, most importantly, was not a 40 year-old man in Baker Street. If I push past the world-weariness of the middle-aged, I can appreciate a younger person’s less-controlled grief and angst. In that prequel, Cypser began to explore reasons why Sherlock Holmes was, in the eyes of many (including quite a few Sherlockians) a reasoning machine. She continued to do so in University, which saw Holmes gain even more control over his emotions, as well as the people he chose to allow into his life. This journey continues in On Stage, but it’s overshadowed by Sherlock’s development as a detective. There are more cases–and more kinds of cases–and more opportunities for him to learn the skills he’ll hone to near-perfection as an adult. Again, Cypser does something I always appreciate: she keeps her cases realistic. Sure, in the future, Holmes will deal with an old man climbing up vines under the influence of monkey glands, and a doctor who has trained a snake to kill, but…perhaps those have been embellished by that incorrigible lover of romance, Dr. Watson. The cases in Ms. Cypser’s book are either (in the case of The Crack in the Lens and a particular mathematics tutor) from Baring-Gould’s Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street, or derived from actual events and situations from Holmes’ time. As in the other books, there are a few cameos–from the Canon, and from real-life. The Canon instances are clever, and while I’m not really a fan of famous (or eventually famous) people turning up in Sherlockian fiction, those in On Stage are not really a stretch.

It’s funny–I always think of Baring-Gould’s placing Holmes in the States as a little silly, but if there’s any fault with University that stands out to me, it’s that Holmes’ visit, which stretches from January through the summer, is a little short, and occasionally seems hurried. It might strain credibility to add another case or adventure, but the Chicago tour is over too quickly, and the return home, although there is some excitement with the train, also passes without much comment. That being said, one of the marks of maturity is that you start to appreciate the routine days where nothing goes wrong, and Holmes does deserve a few of those–much as he might protest them.

Just as University ends with Holmes leaving Cambridge, On Stage ends with him deciding not to return to the stage. His competitors can rest easy; he may wish to spend his life pursuing leads, but they are of a completely different sort. Nor is he going to presume upon his brother’s hospitality any longer; he’s going on…to Montague Place. And if there are, as there were in the previous book, a few loose ends left dangling, I have it on good authority (and the author’s occasional FaceBook posts) that all will eventually be known.

With Sherlock Holmes, one can hardly expect anything else.

[Lucy Pollard-Gott · Rating 5 out of 5]

The art of disguise and role-playing serve Sherlock Holmes very well in the conduct of his investigations, playing a significant part in several of his most famous cases . In A Scandal in Bohemia, for example, Holmes assumes two different disguises, appearing first as a drunken stable groom and later as a clergyman, during his efforts to recover a compromising photograph of the King of Bohemia from the shrewd Irene Adler. Adler herself takes on the disguise of a youthful boy to walk past Holmes unnoticed and ultimately defeat his purposes–earning his respect as a worthy adversary. Holmes clearly enjoyed assuming other identities, and practised their effects even on his friends. In The Empty House, Holmes staged a dramatic reveal indeed, to apprise his friend Dr Watson that he, Holmes, had in fact survived the seemingly fatal scuffle with Prof Moriarty at the Reichenbach Falls (in The Final Problem). He arrived at Watson’s study disguised as an eccentric old bookseller, bent in body, and when Watson turned away for an instant, the old man straightened to his full height, becoming Sherlock once again. Watson fainted, as he reports it, “for the first and the last time in my life.” Holmes was repentant, regretting the shock he had caused by his “unnecessarily dramatic reappearance.” When Watson recovered, Holmes recounted his year incognito as the peripatetic Norwegian Sigerson, taking obvious pleasure in assuming yet another identity.

How did Holmes acquire these skills? Where did he learn to transform himself so thoroughly and stay in character? Sherlockian, filmmaker, and historian Darlene Cypser answers these questions brilliantly in her new novel, The Consulting Detective Trilogy Part II: On Stage. Although it is the second part of a trilogy, it is really the third book in her ongoing series of novels on the evolution of young Sherlock Holmes as a consulting detective. This multipart bildungsroman begins with The Crack in the Lens, in which seventeen-year-old Sherlock first matches wits with Prof Moriarty, the mathematics tutor hired by the boy’s demanding father. Sherlock’s romance with a Violet Rushdale and an ensuing tragedy trigger psychological trauma, which will have long-lasting effects on his life and personality; this period also witnesses the young man’s growing resolve to craft his own career as a consulting detective–a decision that begins to open what will be a permanent rift with his father. Sherlock means to acquire all the skills necessary for the science of detection, and if this includes going to University for some formal education in the chemical and other sciences, he is willing to accede to this opportunity–his father’s wish, in hopes of changing his mind–and make the best of it. Sherlock’s rocky career at Cambridge is recounted in The Consulting Detective Trilogy Part I: University, and he begins to grapple with some cases that arise, applying the skills he has so far acquired–in other words, commencing his true life’s work.

When we meet Sherlock in this book Part II: On Stage, he has been “sent down” from Cambridge because of an explosion he caused in the chemistry lab with an experiment of his devising that went awry. Going home to his unforgiving father in Yorkshire is not an option, so he seeks shelter with his brother Mycroft in London, letting himself in by picking the lock. “If you are going to make a habit of breaking and entering you might want to leave fewer scratches around the key hole in the future. It is quite obvious, ” says Mycroft. These scenes between Sherlock and his phlegmatic elder brother are a wonderful way to begin, since Mycroft patiently lets Sherlock regain his equilibrium before demanding an explanation. Cypser captures Mycroft’s tone perfectly.

Sherlock must pay for the extensive damages at the Cambridge lab, and so starts looking for a job to cover his debt. He and Mycroft take an evening out at the theatre to see Henry Irving’s noteworthy performance of Hamlet, and they run into Sherlock’s classmate Lord Cecil. In my review of Part I: University, I made the connection to the archetypal bildungsroman, Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship by Goethe. In that book, the young hero and his friends form a theatre company to put on Hamlet. This is a happy coincidence, since Sherlock’s chance meeting with his University acquaintance leads him to audition and secure a position with a fledgling theatre group, the Corycian Company led by an ambitious manager named Sassanof. Holmes takes the place of the company’s unsatisfactory Tybalt in their first production, Romeo and Juliet, and he discovers in himself a natural flair for performing on stage. Combined with his hard work and keen intelligence, Sherlock makes a success as an actor from the outset, and decides to stay. Since he excels at swordplay, Holmes soon becomes the company’s resident expert at staging fight scenes as they arise in their expanding repertoire. I should say that although Tybalt is his first part, it is not the first role he assumes. That honor goes to “William Escott,” the stage name he adopts.

One of the perks and responsibilities of acting in this company was the chance to organize and stage a benefit performance, and keep a major portion of the proceeds. Holmes had garnered further experience in a benefit performance of King Lear produced by an older colleague and mentor, Matthew Hallows. Hallows asked his astute young friend “Escott” to play the demanding role of Edgar (and his disguised double Tom o’Bedlam), once again expanding Sherlock’s acting and swordfighting repertoire. When his own turn to select a benefit play arrived, Sherlock made a daring choice. The company had already been performing Colley Cibber’s reduced and softened version of Richard III, which had replaced Shakespeare’s searing original in the theatre of the day, but Sherlock proposed to put on Shakespeare’s Richard III, without compromise, and he cast himself as the lead. Besides staging the drama, the player heading up the benefit was responsible for publicizing it. For this task, a fellow actor offered to join Holmes in recreating one of the swordfights of the play for free in Regents Park. He also heeded the advice to enlist the help of family members. For the sake of making money to put toward paying his college debt, Sherlock “swallowed his pride” and called on Mycroft to help sell tickets and fill the house. In his own discreet but highly effective manner, Mycroft got the job done:

"Mycroft did not hesitate. He took the tickets for the boxes and the dress circle and passed around circulars among his acquaintances. He made no mention of any familial relationship, only that these tickets were for a benefit performance for a young actor who had the temerity to revive Shakespeare’s Richard III. The tickets sold rapidly in his hands." (p. 86)

I love the way Cypser catches Mycroft’s tone and diction, in the snatch of indirect speech I’ve highlighted in bold. (I could certainly hear Charles Gray’s voice, from the Granada television productions, in my head.)

Was Sherlock up to the task of portraying the coldly calculating Richard III in all his malevolence and deformity of soul? I leave it to the reader to imagine, or rather, I encourage you not to miss Cypser’s account of Sherlock’s performance and the reviews it received in the popular press.

The theatre company’s performances were not without incident, many of them quite threatening and mysterious. These mysteries are smoothly interpolated in the story, and they enable Sherlock to fashion an apprenticeship of sorts in collaboration with the local police detectives. One such case puts Sherrinford’s sons in harm’s way–they go missing like Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens–and the solution will reintroduce Sherlock’s friend Jonathan Beckwith (who appeared in his own novella). At one point, as Sherlock and Jonathan are discussing the possibility of child abduction and trafficking, it becomes too much for Sherrinford to hear, but Sherlock replies in a voice both “cold and firm,” showing the mature insight he already possessed and the philosophy that would guide his career.

“'If we are to defeat evil in the world, then we must acknowledge that it exists and try to understand its habits and motivations. If we allow emotions to cloud our minds then we will not be able to find your children.'” (p. 96)

The particular gift of The Consulting Detective Trilogy is the opportunity to witness that, for all his firmness and resolve, Sherlock is still learning to master his own emotions and summon the coolness of judgment and deduction that will serve him best in his many cases yet to come.

In the latter part of the novel, we learn that owing to severe (and rather mysterious) damages to their London home theatre, the Corycian players are forced to become a traveling company. They embark on a wide-ranging U.S. tour that will take them to New York, Boston, Chicago, and San Francisco. Travel was, of course, by rail, and the accounts of the train travel, especially the harrowing ride over the Rockies, were marvelous in their historical detail and genuine suspense–typical of the pace and interest that Cypser sustains throughout this novel. In the spirit of A Study in Scarlet, some stops along the way show the actors a bit of the Wild West and some of its perils.

At each location, Holmes/Escott filled his down time with careful study of the local newspapers, and on several occasions he looked in at the police department to inquire about problems that caught his interest. In New York, he made the acquaintance of Wilson Hargreaves (who would one day be of help in wrapping up The Adventure of the Dancing Men). This time, Hargreaves enlisted young Holmes’ aid in some undercover work, once more honing his skills at disguise and role playing, not to mention the daring business of catching criminals in the act! Back at his job, Holmes picked up many new roles along the way, such as acting in all three parts of Henry VI, which added to Richard III, form a tetralogy. Now, what with impersonating a struggling playwright in his undercover work by day and continuing to act by night, it became quite a feat of juggling and compartmentalized memory.

"Yet it was even more important to stay in character, and to keep this character separate from both William Escott and Sherlock Holmes. That included coordinating his surveillance with his complex performance schedule in which he was playing four different characters on different nights. He had to remind himself who he was supposed to be at the moment. It was a unique challenge that he savoured." (p. 204)

Yes, it was just the sort of challenge that Sherlock would savor all his life, to keep other more troubling emotions at bay.

I can only surmise that Cypser herself savors the challenge of creating such a plausible world for young Sherlock Holmes to inhabit. This book is a wonderfully sophisticated theatre novel. Initially, it reminded me of Rafael Sabatini’s Scaramouche, in which a young lawyer joins an acting company and has many attendant adventures. But The Consulting Detective Trilogy Part II: On Stage is thoroughly a novel of Sherlock Holmes. It is clearly steeped in knowledge of this endlessly fascinating character and his milieu in the Canon of stories and novels by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, readers will enjoy a perfectly apt quote from said Canon at the head of each chapter. But more than that, it works as a satisfying historical novel of theatre life and city life in the period 1875-1876 in England and the United States (and briefly in Paris). This historical grounding especially enhances the chapters that cast young Sherlock as a touring player–and budding detective–in the major American cities of his day.

I applaud this latest installment of Cypser’s trilogy. I enjoyed the theatre lore about Shakespearean characters dear to my heart from The Fictional 100: Ranking the Most Influential Characters in World Literature and Legend, such as Hamlet, King Lear, Romeo and Juliet. Above all, I prize these further adventures of Sherlock Holmes himself (who ranks ninth on my 100 list). I loved standing in the wings to watch Sherlock’s many roles On Stage.

*Note: I received this book free of charge from the author.

[Kennedi · Rating 4 out of 5]

A quick and fun read! I want to give this 4 1/2 stars. I enjoyed reading about Holmes' short-lived career on the stage. As anyone who knows me can tell you, stories about Sherlock's disguises and acting are my favorites. The editing for this book in the trilogy was much smoother as well. I thoroughly enjoyed this, and I can't wait for the next one.

I only wish it was longer!