Bücher der Reihe Sherlock Holmes and the American Literati

The light of an open doorway beckons through the mist of a London Particular, one of those smothering fogs for which turn-of-the-century London was famous. But in reality-as Sherlock Holmes soon discovers-though the doorway does indeed offer respite from the fog, it also leads to the gruesome remains of a double-murder. Two corpses, a stolen diamond necklace, a Russian connection, and a dandified American writer who pals around with denizens of the theater-all add up to a murder investigation with international implications. Leave it to Sherlock Holmes who, in a classic assemblage of suspects in a high-tone British men's club, employs his celebrated powers of deduction to reveal the guilty party.

They called her "Lady Stewart" when she was married to a British aristocrat. They called her "Miss Cora "when she ran a brothel in Florida. But she called herself "Mrs. Crane" when she asked Sherlock Holmes to locate her common-law husband, writer Stephen Crane, who''d gone missing in Cuba during the Spanish-American War. In their attempt to fulfil the lady''s request, Holmes and Watson encounter a world of celebrity authors, terrorist bombings, and haunted manor houses. But it is only when Stephen Crane falls victim to a notorious blackmailer that the master detective and his partner find themselves face-to-face with cold-blooded murder. Under darkened skies, a solitary apparition stood brightly illuminated on the ship''s gloomy deck. Or so it seemed. Cloaked in a long white raincoat-the same gleaming duster he''d worn in the face of Spanish gunfire at San Juan Heights - Stephen Crane looked for all the world like the ghost so many people thought he''d already become.