Q2: Blog Entry #8

" 'Well you can imagine how hard it was to settle down to arduous work at two pounds a week, when I knew that I could earn as much in a day by smearing my face with a little paint, laying my cap on the ground, and sitting still' " (Pg 161.)

Maybe part of what makes Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's stories so interesting, is the fact that he can find a way to put an ethical or moral dilemma into each and every story so that the reader is conflicted in their mind. The reader simply can't decide what the right thing to do would be, so they force themselves to continue to read to see what Sherlock Holmes would do. Isn't Sherlock Holmes always right? Doyle had managed to find a way to make readers rely on Holmes to get answers, and provoke the reader's hope in the idea that everything has an answer an a reason behind it.

Let's get back to the story itself. In this case, Sherlock was assigned the task of finding a man named Mr. Neville St. Clair after he had gone missing. The man who was accused of killing or kidnapping Mr. Neville was an old beggar. That old beggar was the last person to be seen nearby Neville before he went missing. Much to the surprise of many- The old beggar who was arrested but not proven guilty of a crime quite yet, would never be proven guilty of a crime. That old beggar was Neville, with some make up and a disguise on.

The thing that makes the situation of begging with a disguise on so Tragic for Mr. Neville though, is that he earned more money begging for one day than he did writing articles. Every person has a bit of a selfish side, and Neville's had allowed his to get out of control, but can you blame him? Neville increased his wealth to atrocious amounts with barely any effort being involved, besides sitting outside with his hat on the pavement, in a disguise which helped him look like one of the most ugly people London had ever seen.

But maybe he did pay the price of increased wealth, in a different way. Neville had begged Holmes to not reveal to his wife that he had been begging on the streets for money. Neville had begged Holmes to not reveal his deep dark secret to his children. Neville probably had gotten looks from hundreds and hundreds of people that said something along the lines of, "You are a worthless piece of scum. Quit begging for drug money." It seems as though Neville's shame and self-degradation he had gone through while begging, was the price of that increased wealth.

Doyle, Sir Aurthur Conan. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. New York: Barnes & Noble, Inc., 1996.