“Sherlock Holmes was standing smiling at me across my study desk” — illustration to Arthur Conan Doyle's “The Adventure of the Empty Houses” by Sidney Paget

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Sherlock Holmes was standing smiling at me across my study desk

Sidney Paget

1893

Photographic reproduction of ink or watercolor on paper

Illustration for Arthur Conan Doyle's “The Adventure of the Empty House,” p. 452.

Sherlock Holmes returns from the dead.

See below for passage illustrated.

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Formatting and text by George P. Landow

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Passage illustrated

I moved my head to look at the cabinet behind me. When I turned again, Sherlock Holmes was standing smiling at me across my study table. I rose to my feet, stared at him for some seconds in utter amazement, and then it appears that I must have fainted for the first and the last time in my life. Certainly a gray mist swirled before my eyes, and when it cleared I found my collar-ends undone and the tingling after-taste of brandy upon my lips. Holmes was bending over my chair, his flask in his hand.

"My dear Watson," said the well-remembered voice, "I owe you a thousand apologies. I had no idea that you would be so affected."

I gripped him by the arms.

"Holmes!" I cried. "Is it really you? Can it indeed be that you are alive? Is it possible that you succeeded in climbing out of that awful abyss?"

Bibliography

Doyle, Arthur Conan. The Original Illustrated Sherlock Holmes. “Reproduced from the original publication in The Strand Magazine with the classic illustrations by Sidney Paget.” Edison, New Jersey: Castle Books, [after 1954]. Internet Archive version of a copy donated by Friends of the San Francisco Library. Web.

Last modified 13 December 2013