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he didn’t sound distressed. He sounded eager, as if he found the situation stimulating. He produced a paper sack from his pocket, popped a horehound drop into his mouth. “But right up your alley, eh, Mr. Holmes?”
    The Englishman bowed.
    “And yours, Andrew. Eh? The law and all that.”
    “Hardly,” the man with the drinker’s nose said. “You know I handle civil, not criminal, cases. Why don’t you introduce us, Caleb? Unless Mr. Quincannon already knows who I am.”
    Quincannon decided he didn’t particularly like the fellow. Or Axminster, for that matter. Or the gaunt Englishman. In fact, he did not like anybody tonight, not even himself very much.
    “Certainly,” the doctor said. “This is Andrew Costain, Mr. Quincannon, and his wife, Penelope. And this most distinguished gentleman from far-off England…”
    “Costain?” Quincannon interrupted. “Offices on Geary Street, residence near South Park?”
    “By God,” Costain said, “he does know me. But if we’ve met, sir, I don’t remember the time or place. In court, was it?”
    “We haven’t met anywhere. Your name happens to be on the list.”
    “List?” Penelope Costain said. She was a slender, gray-eyed, brown-curled woman some years younger than her husband—handsome enough, although she appeared too aloof and wore too much rouge and powder for Quincannon’s taste. “What list?”
    “Of actual and potential burglary victims, all of whom own valuables insured by the Great Western Insurance Company.”
    This information seemed to make her husband even more dyspeptic. He rubbed nervously at his middle again as he asked, “Where did such a list come from?”
    “That remains to be determined. Likely from someone affiliated or formerly affiliated with Great Western Insurance.”
    “And Truesdale’s name is also on the list, I suppose. That’s what brought you to his home tonight.”
    “Among other things,” Quincannon said.
    Axminster sucked the horehound drop, his brow screwed up in thought. “Quincannon, John Quincannon … why, of course! I knew I’d heard the name before. Carpenter and Quincannon, Professional Detective Services. Yes, and your partner is a woman.”
    “A woman,” the man called Holmes said. “How curious.”
    Quincannon skewered him with a sharp eye. “What’s curious about it? Both Mrs. Carpenter and her late husband were valued operatives of the Pinkerton Detective Agency.”
    “Upon my soul. In England, you know, it would be extraordinary for a woman to assume the profession of consulting detective, the more so to be taken in as a partner in a private inquiry agency.”
    “She wasn’t ‘taken in,’ as you put it. Our partnership was by mutual arrangement.”
    “Ah.”
    Quincannon demanded, “What do you know of private detectives, in England or anywhere?”
    “He knows a great deal, as a matter of fact,” Axminster said with relish. He asked the Englishman, “You have no objection if I reveal your identity to a colleague?”
    “None, inasmuch as you have already revealed it to your other guests.”
    The doctor beamed. He said as if presenting a member of British royalty, “My honored houseguest, courtesy of a mutual acquaintance in the south of France, is none other than Mr. Sherlock Holmes of 221 B Baker Street, London, England.”
    Sherlock Holmes, my eye, Quincannon thought. This must be the fellow Bitter Bierce had written about in his column in this morning’s Examiner —the crackbrain posing as the legendary detective.
    He said, “Holmes, eh? Not according to Mr. Ambrose Bierce.”
    Axminster made sputtering noises. “Bierce is a poisonous fool. You can’t believe a word the man writes.”
    “I assure you, Mr. Quincannon, that I am indeed Sherlock Holmes.” The Englishman bowed. “At your service, sir.”
    “I’ve already had a sampling of your ‘service,’” Quincannon said irascibly. “I prefer my own.”
    “Nous verrons.”
    King’s English, and now French.