DATE & SOURCE

EVENTS

COMMENTS

"A crisp morning in the fall of the year 1888." Possibly September 6. STUDY 13

"Jack the Ripper's latest atrocity" is described in the papers. Mary Morstan Watson receives a letter from her sick Aunt Agatha in Cornwall and leaves.

Mary's letter might be a ruse to get her away so that a soul-clone might be implanted (explaining her behavior in the "Case of the Missing Martian" comic). Reminds one of the "sick traveler" letter in "The Final Problem." The name Jack the Ripper is used far too early.

Same day. STUDY 18, 19

Holmes receives a surgical kit (from an unknown source) in the mail, with the post mortem knife missing.

Holmes has no interest in the "demented oaf" of Whitechapel.

STUDY 24

The writing on the package is in a woman's hand. A coat of arms on the kit belongs to "Kenneth Osbourne, the Duke of Shires" in Devonshire.

The fact that a knife is missing somehow "implies" it has something to do with the Ripper (p. 40).

Next day (September 7?) STUDY 30+

H&W travel to Shire's Castle, not far from the Baskerville holdings.

The Duke tells Holmes rudely that the instrument case belonged to his younger son Michael, who is "dead".

STUDY 35

Holmes purposely drops the instrument case when bumping into the Duke's elder son, Lord Carfax. Carfax correctly fits the instruments back into the kit. Carfax is with his young daughter Deborah.

In the movie, this proved Carfax was familiar with their use (and therefore the Ripper). Carfax explains that Michael was disowned for marrying beneath his station.

Next morning (September 8?) STUDY 46

The Baker Street Irregulars appear.

They have located the shop at which the surgeon's kit was pawned.

Same morning STUDY 48

H&W meet Joseph Beck, the pawnshop owner, who says a woman with a scarred face bought the kit.

The kit was pledged by a Miss Sally Young of Whitechapel.

STUDY 52

H&W walk to a nearby mortuary and find, to their surprise Inspector Lestrade. The "fifth" Ripper victim has just been brought in.

How could H&W avoid the loud publicity accompanying a Ripper murder on their walk through Whitechapel?

STUDY 53

Holmes says "others may have been dismembered and thoroughly disposed of." They meet Dr. Murray, in charge of the neighboring hostelry. Lestrade names the dead woman Annie Chapman.

Sounds like Holmes is aware of the "Thames Torso Murders," claimed by some as Ripper killings. Annie Chapman was slain after Polly Nichols (see below). She was actually taken to the Whitechapel Workhouse Infirmary Mortuary, and Dr. Bagster Phillips did the post mortem.

STUDY 59

H&W find Sally Young, Dr. Murray's niece, who stays at Murray's hostel.

The surgical kit belonged to "Pierre", a man found wandering with a head injury, now permanently demented.

STUDY 62+

Lord Carfax appears at the hostel. After leaving, H&W are set upon by three thugs in an alley.

Carfax finances the hospital. That he visits often was an excuse to be in Whitechapel (where he committed the murders) in the movie version.

Next day (September 9?). STUDY 69+

Holmes reviews the case and all the people in it.

Holmes mentions that Carfax knew where the instruments went in the kit. There still seems to be no real link to the Ripper.

STUDY 73+

Meeting with Mycroft Holmes in the Diogenes Club.

Both Holmeses are aware that "Pierre" is Michael Osbourne, Carfax's brother.

Next day (Sept. 10?). STUDY 82+

Holmes leaves in the morning. In the evening, Watson decides to investigate on his own. He enters a pub called the Angel & Crown and meets "Polly", a hooker.

Watson sees Max Klein, the enormous owner of the pub, toss out a drunken sailor. He also spots Joseph Beck, the pawnshop owner.

STUDY 87+

Watson and Polly spot a hideously scarred, malevolent looking man, who follows Polly out into the night. Watson follows him.

The grotesquerie is Holmes in disguise. "He was the man," writes Watson. "Explaining my absolute certainty is difficult . . . Instinct, a sixth sense -- call it what you will." A disturbing implication that comes to fruition in THE LAST SHERLOCK HOLMES STORY.

STUDY 90+

As Holmes and Watson struggle with each other in the darkness, the Ripper kills Polly. Holmes rushes to Beck's pawnshop, but Beck has obviously been in bed some time.

Or is it "Polly"? So many mutilations in the few seconds it took to follow the woman's screams seem unlikely. "But he had so little time! How?" asks Watson.

September 11? STUDY 97+

Back to Dr. Murray's mortuary. Holmes learns the story of Michael Osbourne from Lord Carfax.

Someone (Max Klein) with a blackmail scheme beat Michael and disfigured his wife Angela's face.

Days pass. STUDY 109

Holmes "vanished from Baker Street each evening." On the third morning he returns with cuts and bruises.

More thugs attacked Holmes. Moriarty, say he, "is occupied elsewhere." That Moriarty is bothered by the Ripper murders may tie into RETURN OF MORIARTY.

Same morning. STUDY 117

A thin lad delivers the missing post-mortem knife and flees.

Holmes chases after but loses him.

Late that evening (early September 30?) STUDY 124

Watson joins Holmes at Dr. Murray's mortuary. A badly butchered victim lies therein.

Is this Catharine Eddowes? London and especially Whitechapel should be in an uproar. And what of Liz Stride, killed the same night? Eddowes was actually taken to Golden Lane Mortuary, and a Dr. F. Gordon Brown examined her.

Same night STUDY 129

A remark from a prostitute leads H&W to a boarding house. A note from Mycroft shows that Max Klein mysteriously came into money, allowing him to buy the Angel & Crown.

The Ripper has fled the boarding house, leaving behind a woman's breast. H&W rush to the Angel & Crown with the unfortunate Michael Osbourne in tow.

Same night STUDY 140

H&W confront Angela, Michael's wife, her face scarred by a knife. She has been living in rooms above the pub.

Angela worked as a prostitute for Klein. When she fell in love with Michael, Klein saw an opportunity for blackmail. But both stood up to him, and Klein nearly killed them.

STUDY 145

Angela sent the kit to Holmes, sure the missing knife would attract his attention to both herself and the Ripper. She believes Klein is the Ripper. Klein bursts in with a pistol.

Angela seems to be the only one to tie the Ripper in with her own affairs, and her reasoning seems poor: "I can conceive of no one save Max as being capable of such atrocities."

STUDY 148+

Klein and a hired thug tie up Watson and escort Holmes downstairs to "take care of him." Angela is too frightened to release Watson. Lord Carfax suddenly appears.

"Oh God in Heaven! It is Jack the Ripper!" cries Angela. Watson is relieved until he sees "the madness in that noble face, a hungry, wild-beast's urge to destroy."

STUDY 151

Carfax kills Angela, sets the room on fire with oil lamps, and, curiously, releases Watson. "Tell them that Lord Carfax is Jack the Ripper!" he cries.

Watson is injured by falling from a window. The film version ends with Holmes fighting Carfax in the blazing room.

12 hours later STUDY 153

"Rudyard", the doctor taking care of Watson's business, attends to him. Holmes explains his own escape, aided by the confusion of the fire.

Carfax, Michael, Angela, and Klein all die in the fire.

STUDY 155

The Duke of Shires kills himself in his Berkeley Square house.

Holmes lets Watson draw the wrong conclusions.

January 12, 1908. STUDY 165

Even twenty years later, Holmes refuses to let Watson publish his notes on the Ripper case. He placates the Doctor with a new tale, "The Case of the Peruvian Sinbad."

Watson prepares a manuscript anyway, possibly getting some details mixed up after 20 adventurous years.

"Three quarters of a century" after 1888 (1963). STUDY 8, 26

Someone places a forgotten manuscript by Dr. Watson into the car of millionaire playboy Grant Ames III as he attends a party.

Ames delivers the manuscript to Ellery Queen, who suffers writer's block. Inspector Queen is on vacation in Bermuda due to "overwork".

Same day. STUDY 46

As a note accompanying the manuscript is in a woman's hand, Ames decides to question all the women who were at the party.

For a useless drunken sot, Ames is quite intelligent and seems to have memorized every word of the Holmes Canon (and Ellery Queen's own books).

Next day. STUDY 118

Ames falls in love with Rachel Hager, an avid gardener.

Her grandmother is the one who placed the manuscript in his car.

STUDY 134

The old grandmother calls Ellery Queen.

She insists that "he" did not do it.

STUDY 158

Inspector Queen returns from Bermuda. Ellery tracks down Deborah Osbourne Spain -- Lord Carfax's daughter.

Ellery tells her that her father was, indeed, innocent of the Ripper murders. (But killing Angela Osbourne was OK?)

STUDY 168

Ellery explains to his father that Lord Carfax was not the Ripper. Max Klein nearly killed Michael and Angela because he didn't need them. He found someone better to blackmail -- the Ripper -- the Duke of Shires himself! Lord Carfax imitated the Ripper to save the reputation of his father, and he used the disguise to slay Angela, whom he blamed for Michael's condition. The Duke killed himself before any news of his sons' deaths could have reached him. Why? Because Carfax had found him covered with gore at the boarding house and accused him.

The movie version of STUDY, in which Carfax is the Ripper, actually makes more sense in this respect. The Duke is barely seen in either the book or the film, and it feels slightly unfair, in a mystery-genre sort of way, to have him be the culprit. Queen's reasoning seems to be based on how quickly the Duke committed suicide; could Watson have gotten the timing wrong?