Discussion Post: His Last Bow

[spacemutineer.livejournal.com]

Hi, everybody! Hope you are having a lovely holiday season, be it Christmas, Hanukkah, or Solstice! I expect we'll have some late entries this week with everyone busy, but don't worry about it. Post when you can about this week's story: His Last Bow - The War Service of Sherlock Holmes.

As always, here are some questions and thoughts to get you started. Please add your own!

- Do you think Holmes was enticed to come out of retirement for this job "under strong pressure" from his brother as well as the Foreign Minister and the Premier? Mycroft is never named specifically and his advanced age makes it somewhat questionable. But there are a "half-dozen people in the world who were really in touch with the truth" about Van Bork. Doesn't it seem like Mycroft would be one of them?

- The hints of coming modernity are interesting here, particularly the cars. Baron Von Herling is driven in a "huge 100-horse-power Benz", and Watson drives Holmes/Altamont in a small Ford.

- Holmes and Watson seem to have fallen far out of touch here, sadly. They both seem overjoyed to see each other, but why does Holmes say this "may be the last quiet talk that we shall ever have"? Is he just referring to the coming war here or something else? Do you think they stayed in touch after this or drifted apart again?

- Side note that made me laugh: I love Holmes' disguise goatee and his and Watson's revulsion at it!

Comments

[thesmallhobbit.livejournal.com]

We tend to assume that Holmes and Watson would stay in touch after all they have been through together and the closeness they enjoyed. So it does seem strange when they don't, perhaps just because as men they corresponded less. Given the situation it probably is reasonable that they would again lose touch either just drifting apart as happened before, or because the war would split them, or that age would take its toll.