Holmes and I were finishing a late luncheon when the page-boy brought up a card bearing the name of Mr Arthur Pelham, of Pelham & Roe, Publishers, Henrietta Street, Covent Garden. Pelham came in upon the boy's heels, a stout, bearded man in his middle fifties, his usually florid colour quite gone. "It is the manuscript," he said before he was well in the room. "Three chapters of Sir Henry Hereford's new romance. Two thousand pounds at the least, if it is published; nothing at all if it is anywhere else first. It was in my locked drawer at six o'clock yesterday evening. It was not in my locked drawer at half past eight this morning." Holmes invited him to sit and to relate the matter from the beginning. The publisher composed himself and did so. The manuscript was the only fair copy; Sir Henry was abroad and had given Pelham strict instructions to permit no one to see it before publication. The drawer was an inner one in the great writing-table in Pelham's private office. The key never left his watch-chain. The office had been swept and locked at half past six the preceding evening; at eight, when the office was opened by the cleaner, all was as it had been left. Pelham himself had unlocked the drawer at half past eight. The chapters were gone, and a single sheet of his own letter-paper, blank, lay folded in their place.
The 221B Daily
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Tuesday, 28 April 2026 | Difficulty II
The Adventure of the Editor's Locked Drawer
Three chapters of an unpublished romance, locked in a drawer at six o'clock; gone by half past eight. The key never left the publisher's watch-chain.
Sidney Paget · The Strand Magazine, August 1891 · Public Domain
Watson’s account
Section I
The Scene
- Setting
- Pelham & Roe, Publishers — a four-storey building in Henrietta Street, Covent Garden
- Time
- Wednesday morning, late November 1894
- Weather
- Cold, bright, the gutters running with the night's rain
- Atmosphere
- A respectable trade publisher, all dark wood and Morris paper, the smell of fresh ink from the press in the basement.
Section II
The Suspects
-
Mr Henry Roe
Junior partner, twenty years in the firm
A grave, soft-spoken man of forty-five, lately disappointed (Pelham acknowledged) by a partnership reorganisation that had reduced his share. He had been in the office until half past five on the Tuesday and had dined with his sister-in-law in Bloomsbury that evening, leaving the office before Pelham himself.
-
Mrs Margaret Polson
The cleaner, six years in the firm's employ
A widow of fifty, of unimpeachable character. She let herself in at five minutes to eight on the Wednesday morning with the great key Pelham had entrusted to her. She swept the rooms in her usual order — clerks' room first, then the partners' offices — and was at her work when Pelham arrived.
-
Mr Felix Underhill
Compositor, employed in the basement press-room
A pale, ink-stained young man of thirty, of uncertain temper. He had had words with Pelham some weeks before regarding a fortnight's wages he believed himself owed. He had left the press-room shortly after eleven o'clock on the Tuesday evening, his work being done.
-
Mr Cyril Hatchard
Reader for the firm, three years' employment, lives in Bedford Square
A tall, fair young man of thirty-two, much trusted by Pelham, who had brought him in to read Sir Henry's manuscript on the Friday previous. He had returned the manuscript on the Monday evening with a long and admiring report. He had not been in the office on the Tuesday.
-
Mr Thomas Linnett
Office-boy, fourteen years of age, three months in the firm
A bright, sharp-eyed lad with a habit of quiet attentiveness. He was in the office until eight o'clock the previous evening, having been kept late to copy a letter for Mr Roe. He let himself out by the area door, locking it behind him with the ordinary boy's key.
Section III
The Evidence
-
The blank sheet of letter-paper
A single half-sheet of the firm's own letter-paper, folded once and laid in the drawer in the place of the missing chapters. Holmes examined it under his lens and reported it bore the faint impression, on its underside, of writing in a child's careful round-hand. He held it to the lamp and, by the candle, could read the words "Dear Mother" at the head.
-
The position of the key
The key to the inner drawer hung upon Pelham's watch-chain at all times. Pelham had taken supper at his club after closing the office and had walked home; the chain had not, by his own account, left his waistcoat-pocket the entire evening.
-
A spare key in the safe
A duplicate key to the inner drawer was kept in the firm's small safe, the combination of which was known to Pelham, to Roe, and (in case of fire) to the senior clerk. The safe was untouched on the Tuesday evening; the dial was at the day's setting when Pelham examined it the next morning.
-
Underhill's grievance
The compositor had, some weeks earlier, accused Pelham to the foreman of withholding wages. The matter had been settled in the firm's favour, but Underhill was understood to remain aggrieved.
-
Hatchard's earlier reading of the manuscript
The reader had had the chapters in his own house from the Friday to the Monday. He could, had he wished, have made a fair copy in those four days.
-
The office-boy's letter
The office-boy keeps up a regular Sunday letter to his mother in Norwich. Holmes ascertained, by quiet inquiry of Mrs Polson, that the boy was in the habit of using stray office paper for his drafts and folding them into his pocket when he left.
Section IV
Statements & Testimony
-
Mr Arthur Pelham Reliable
The client, senior partner
“"The drawer was locked at six. It was locked at half past eight. The key has not left my person. I cannot, sir, explain it; I have come to you because I do not know how to begin."”
-
Mrs Margaret Polson Partial
Cleaner
“"I came in at five to eight as I do every morning. I went into the partners' room last, sir, as is my way. The drawer was shut. I did not see it open, nor did I hear any sound, but the area door was upon the latch when I came up from the basement at a quarter past, which I thought a curious thing."”
-
Mr Henry Roe Reliable
Junior partner
“"I left the building at five-thirty and dined with my sister-in-law. I returned to my own rooms before ten. I have been in the firm twenty years, sir; the suggestion that I should take a manuscript out of my own partner's drawer is one I cannot answer with words."”
Section V