The grave failures of Sherlock Holmes

‘The Five Orange Pips’ Re-Imagined

In this fifth adventure, John Openshaw visits Baker Street to consult Sherlock Holmes as to the mysterious deaths of both his uncle and father upon the arrival of letters containing five dried orange pips and bearing the mark “K.K.K.”. The young gentleman further relates that he too has received a similar envelope with instructions to surrender some papers. Holmes quickly deduces that his client faces imminent danger from a secret society in America.

“Shook out five little dried orange pips.”

The death of clients

This adventure, which Conan Doyle ranked seventh in a list of his twelve favourite Sherlock Holmes stories, is notable as the client of the Great Detective is murdered after seeking his help. Although Holmes appreciates the seriousness of the situation for his client upon hearing the details of the case, he underestimates the urgency of the matter. In fact, Holmes instructs his client to return home to carry out the demands of the secret organization threatening his life, while the detective remains at Baker Street to mull over the facts of the case, at which time his client is murdered. A similar fate befalls another of Holmes’s clients in ‘The Adventure of the Dancing Men’, which I hope will be the next story to be published in the Sherlock Holmes Re-Imagined book series. In that adventure, Holmes does not directly accompany his client to the latter’s Norfolk home after hearing the facts bearing on the case, although in this instance the detective lacks sufficient information to take immediate action. When Holmes finally can act it is too late as his client has already been murdered. As an aside, it is interesting to note that in both of the cases mentioned above, garden sundials feature as the location of the exchange of information between Holmes’s clients and their eventual killers.

“Holmes, I cried, you are too late.”

As much of the action of ‘The Five Orange Pips’, besides for recollections by their client, takes place in the Baker Street residence of Holmes and Watson, rendering the Sidney Paget illustrations in LEGO® required designing and building furniture that is to the scale of the minifigures. As can be seen in the photos above, LEGO® minifigures do not possess normal human body proportions but rather are quite short and squat. Because of this, and given the average size of LEGO® bricks and pieces, it can be somewhat difficult to create furniture and other accessories that are appropriately sized. The table and chair in the above photo were used in several earlier adventures, but for the current story I had to design a couple of other tables as well as an umbrella and two oil lamps, including the one in the first illustration above. 

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All 12 books in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes Re-Imagined book series, as well as a complete collector’s edition incorporating all of the stories, are available for purchase on Amazon UK, the Book Depository (with free worldwide delivery), and the MX Publishing website.

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