On "The Five Orange Pips" [FIVE] from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
::: PUBLICATION HISTORY :::
The Strand Magazine (UK) November 1891
The Strand Magazine (US) December 1891
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (Coll.) October 1892
CHARACTERS: 1.5/2
SETTING: 2/2
PLOT: 1.5/2
PROBLEM: 1.5/2
SOLUTION: .5/2
FINAL GRADE: 7/10
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::: NOTES :::
"Some, too, have baffled his analytical skill, and would be, as narratives, beginnings without an ending, while others have been but partially cleared up, and have their explanations founded rather upon conjecture and surmise than on that absolute logical proof which was so dear to him." Well, you can't say Watson didn't call his narrative shot right there in paragraph number the first. Then in the next, he intros maybe the main or at the least most pivotal character of the tale--the aggressively gloomy weather.
Then, we get to one John Openshaw. A young man who serves to posit sins-of-the-father lines of questioning and examining; for his inheritance, unbeknownst to him, is of evil roots. An interesting conversation ensues between Openshaw and Holmes, with Watson looking on. A large part of this is ::: very ::: steeped in the times of Victorian England--because, yes--we now all quite know what those initials stand for. It's within that bit of oddity, or alongside it, that Holmes poo-poos the Popo, and utters: "I am the last court of appeal." Tuck that in your brain-attics, Gentlepersons.
Also in that initial (and final) consultation: “Do not think of revenge, or anything of the sort, at present. I think that we may gain that by means of the law; but we have our web to weave, while theirs is already woven.” May. hmmm (brain-attics). Alas, not only will revenge be at the least postponed, but immediately after leaving 221b, Openshaw is murdered in much the same way as was his uncle & father. Thus marking the first of only two times that Holmes loses a client. (The other is Hilton Cubitt in The Adventure of the Dancing Men.)
“That hurts my pride, Watson,” he said at last. “It is a petty feeling, no doubt, but it hurts my pride. It becomes a personal matter with me now, and, if God sends me health, I shall set my hand upon this gang." (Brain-attics.) Interesting, how ACD frames the juxtaposition in this one. Fate is at work and free will cannot be flexed even by a Baritsu master of a thinking machine such as Holmes. He can stop neither weather nor God from acting in mysterious ways. We are all but farts in the gales of London, and in light of this, we see Holmes here at his most human. Not sure if 'juxtaposition' is the right word, but it's a good one.
But the young Openshaw's death: "It is conjectured that he may have been hurrying down to catch the last train from Waterloo Station, and that in his haste and the extreme darkness he missed his path and walked over the edge of one of the small landing-places for river steamboats," ran the morning papers. Let me now introduce a similar bit from elsewhere in canon:
“'Jack has been lost overboard in gale off St. Helena. No one knows how accident occurred." That from The Valley of Fear [VALL] regarding how Birdy Edwards was said to have met his fate and doom at the stroke of Sherlock's arch-nemesis. Is this FIVE death of a young heir a fine spot in which to retro-fit Moriarty, or what? Does Moriarty wield these men who leave pips and murder? The Modus Operandi fits, as well as I have heard Sherlockian Scholarship refer to VALL's Boss McGinty as an American Moriarty.
So we have the problem, we'll get to the solution more & soon, but for now, let's have at the plot. Big grading ding here with a good dose of both willy-nilly chronological time-hopping, as well as Watson spousal confusions. Let's tackle chronology and let's do-so in regards to Irene Adler. Please then allow me to plug in the following from my On "A Scandal in Bohemia" from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle...
"So, this one isn't about Holmes being bested by the woman, as he was not. He has, again, a happy client and no criminal has retained nor gained their freedom. Plus, nothing took him unawares. Later in the canon, Holmes reminisces about being bested only four times, thrice by men and once by a woman.
"Not the woman as we have been told he refers to her as. Also, we hear of this in The Five Orange Pips, which chronologically occurs a year prior to SCAN. Furthermore, that's hardly the mention you'd expect from a fellow who could have earned a chunk of a kingdom and settled instead on a cabinet photo of his true and perhaps favorite unofficial client."
In short, this whole dang thing is iffy, albeit iffy written in a super-entertaining and mood-driven manner. Not bad at all, quite good even. Then we get to the solution. Holmes has sent a client off to his doom and has sworn to exact his revenge on the murderous clan of continent-hopping Florida citrus pit omening fanatics. He sends them the self-same omen of their own impending doom--on ahead for them to receive in America. Except...
"There is ever a flaw, however, in the best laid of human plans, and the murderers of John Openshaw were never to receive the orange pips which would show them that another, as cunning and as resolute as themselves, was upon their track. Very long and very severe were the equinoctial gales that year. We waited long for news of the Lone Star of Savannah, but none ever reached us. We did at last hear that somewhere far out in the Atlantic a shattered stern-post of a boat was seen swinging in the trough of a wave, with the letters “L. S.” carved upon it, and that is all which we shall ever know of the fate of the Lone Star."
Hard to tell if this is like a poker game bad beat, ten-thousand spoons when all you need is a knife,--or Sherlock Holmes murdering them all and covering his tracks as well as you'd expect (you may now empty your brain-attics). What we do know is that something super-similar to this anti-climactic ending is employed in The Adventure of the Resident Patient, simply supplant Lone Star for Norah Creina wreckage whilst cargoing abroad the baddies. This is all to say that this story lacks in some major ways, if scratched beneath its somehow delightful to read militant melancholy maliciousness.
In closing, much of FIVE reads like viewing an artist's hand study sketchings. You draw a hand this way, you draw the same hand that way, you do it again. Again. Again. & again. I will say the hand sketching here is quite a ways along insofar as technique. But why not let the murderers escape and further highlight injustice and spooky tale tellings of on-the-loose killers with their travel expenses paid-for? Why must God be good? Is it chilly in here or is it just my (tingling) spine?
Still, this is a hopeless if not nihilistic adventure. A Seinfeld episode written by Meursault.
SETTING: 2/2
PLOT: 1.5/2
PROBLEM: 1.5/2
SOLUTION: .5/2
FINAL GRADE: 7/10
I'd like to take a moment to remind you kind Gentlepersons that I write these thoughts under the assumption of you having read these adventures. They are readily available everywhere, including for free at Project Gutenberg.
::: COMPANION READING :::
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::: very :::