We are delighted to welcome back author Barry S. Brown to Omnimystery News.
Around the time that Mrs. Hudson in New York (MX Publishing; August 2015 trade paperback and ebook formats), his most recent mystery in this series, was published, Barry contributed a guest post in which he opined, "Write what you know — Not!".
Today Barry returns with a most entertaining post, in which he writes about "The First Lady of Baker Street".
— ♦ —
Photo provided courtesy of
Barry S. Brown
Let me first make clear I am not happy pointing fingers. And of course I have only the greatest respect for Dr. Watson. He did, after all, serve in Afghanistan, and I know I join with others in expressing appreciation for his service. Still, I see no choice other than to call him to task for his part in the cover-up as relates to events at 221B Baker Street.
Mind you, I understand perfectly the need for a cover-up. Nearly any business organized in London during the Victorian age would require a male figurehead to front that organization. And the first consulting detective agency would likely have a greater need than most. I'm aware, as well, of the agreement among the residents of 221B to hold fast to the story they had jointly concocted. In that context, Watson, as the agency's publicist, could hardly have been expected to out his colleagues. Still, one might have hoped for an artfully contrived hint, the insertion of a seemingly careless phrase, anything that might give notice of the reality he knew. Instead, we are left with the task of piecing together that reality for ourselves.
We can start with the lodgings at 221B for which Mrs. Hudson is landlady, which is to say for which she has acquired a lease to let rooms and collect rents. The acquisition of a lease suggests disposable income. For a woman to have access to disposable income she would have to be an heiress, or the wife of a man with a reasonable income. Her title of Mrs. suggests the latter, the absence of a husband makes clear her widowed status.
There is then the matter of the lodgers Mrs. Hudson obtains for her apartments. We are meant to believe that Holmes and Watson came to be Mrs. Hudson's tenants by sheer happenstance. And that is where the cover-up begins.
In fact, Mrs. Hudson, in advertising the availability of rooms, indicated that "applicants should possess an inquiring mind and curiosity about human behavior." We know now that the carefully worded advertisement was critical to Mrs. Hudson's plan for creating a consulting detective agency in the lodgings she managed. The advertisement led to her selection of a sometime chemist whose haughty self-confidence she was certain would attract the aptly named "carriage trade." Finding the chemist accompanied by the steadfast Dr. Watson was a stroke of unexpected good fortune. With their recruitment Mrs. Hudson was well on her way.
She had prepared for the moment through 29 years of nightly analyses of crimes reported in London's Evening Standard in company with her husband, Tobias, a member of the Metropolitan Police Force until his untimely death, and the man she called her "uncommon common constable." She complemented the knowledge she gained about conducting a criminal investigation with readings of poisons, guns and gunshot wounds, knives and stab wounds, falls, and the assortment of additional mayhem available from the literature she obtained at the British Museum Library. Over the years she also cultivated an ability to read people, observing hands, face, dress, and the gait of those she saw on the street, at the greengrocers, and on horse-cars and the underground. Her investigative and observational skills, combined with her capacity for deductive analysis, and supported by the legwork of her colleagues, led to a host of successes by the consulting detective agency she had founded. Holmes, of course, took credit for each of those successes and Watson developed the reports that gave credence to that fiction.
In fairness, we should note there is every indication Watson was a reluctant scribe. Rather than demean his landlady's role he simply ignores her. She goes without description beyond a single reference to her "stately tread," and is not given a first name or any clue as to her background. Most significantly of all, rather than participating any more largely than necessary in the subterfuge, Watson includes Mrs. Hudson in less than a quarter of the sixty stories purporting to detail Holmes' exploits.
The Victorian era being well behind us, the wrongs done Mrs. Hudson more than a century ago can finally be corrected, and the truth revealed of Mrs. Hudson's achievements. I take no special pride for my part in helping to right past wrongs. One simply does what one must. I would, however, urge others to weigh the evidence and draw their own conclusions. In that spirit those with open minds might turn to the Mrs. Hudson of Baker Street Facebook page to learn more about the First Lady of Baker Street, and spread the word of her accomplishments.
— ♦ —
Barry S. Brown spent his professional life conducting research examining treatment issues and strategies in mental health, criminal justice programming and drug abuse. Over the course of his career he published over 100 papers and chapters as well as editing two books of non-fiction. He has also published a half dozen short stories and some poetry in addition to the four books in the Mrs. Hudson of Baker Street series.
For more information about the author, please visit his author page on Goodreads, or find him on Facebook.
— ♦ —
Mrs. Hudson in New York by Barry S. Brown
A Mrs. Hudson of Baker Street Mystery
Publisher: MX Publishing
Accompanied by Holmes and Watson, Mrs. Hudson crosses the ocean to attend the wedding of her cousin's daughter. They disembark to discover that the young lady's fiancée, a pitcher for the Brooklyn Bridegrooms, stands accused of an attempt on the life of JP Morgan and the death of his aide. A self-declared enemy of Morgan and the robber barons, the ballplayer ran from the scene of the crime and, when captured, was found in possession of a gun with two spent cartridges, the same number and caliber as that used in the attack. Before a wedding can be held, the unacknowledged sage of Baker Street will lead Holmes and Watson along a path of investigation taking them from JP Morgan's mansion to the gambling dens of New York's Tenderloin.
With the enthusiastic assistance of Samuel Clemens, the reluctant assistance of Morgan, and the cautious assistance of a leader in the African Broadway community, they will identify the financier's attacker, frustrate efforts to corrupt the game of baseball, and rescue the prospective bride and groom from would-be assassins before returning finally to the comparative quiet of 221B Baker Street.
— Mrs. Hudson in New York by Barry S. Brown
