Smacking Holmes upside the head; an analysis of Silver Blaze
The dog in the night-time
Let’s look first at one of the most famous exchanges in the Canon. Before Holmes leaves King’s Pyland (and after he has told Ross his hopes the horse will run), he asks a stable boy if anything amiss has happened to Ross’ sheep. The boy mentions that several sheep have gone lame; Holmes remarks on this to the inspector.
“You consider that to be important?” he [Gregory] asked.
“Exceedingly so.”
“Is there any point to which you would wish to draw my attention?”
“To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time.”
“The dog did nothing in the night-time.”
“That was the curious incident,” remarked Sherlock Holmes.
We later learn from Holmes that the fact the dog did not bark indicated it knew the person who had come to take the horse away. That person was Straker, of course, who Holmes explained had been leading a double life. The receipts found on Straker were his and indicated he’d bought expensive clothes for a woman not his wife, a fact confirmed when Holmes showed Straker’s photograph to the milliner in London. Holmes theorizes that Straker needed money and planned to lame the horse and presumably bet against it, but he needed to practice first on the sheep.
Two curious incidents
This exchange is a brilliant example of Holmes noticing the absence of a thing. Fellow Sherlockian Larry Feldman brought to my attention this has a name: Sherlockismus, coined by Ronald Knox. (I suppose this makes up for finding Simpson more guilty by the lack of evidence agains him.) But I must mention there are actually two curious incidents regarding the dog during the night-time. The first is when Simpson arrives to gain information from the stable boy. There is no mention in the story about this stranger’s arrival causing the dog to bark.
Simpson arrived after nine p.m. on a dark night, first accosting the maid on her way to deliver the stable boy his curried mutton, and again as she hands the boy his food. She had found him sitting at a table awaiting his dinner and not investigating why the dog is barking. In other words, the dog is doing nothing and so the later incident of the doing nothing must be discounted.
There are other curious incidents as well. When Holmes asks Ross of Straker: “He has been in your service some years, Colonel Ross?” The colonel responds: “I have always found him an excellent servant.” I would point out he is not answering the question asked and in fact the answer seems somewhat defensive.
Another curious incident: Far from removing Silver Blaze from the race, Colonel Ross removes his other horse, Bayard: “We scratched our other one, and put all hopes on your word [that Silver Blaze would race].”
Curious incident three: Holmes criticizes Inspector Gregory for lacking imagination, but Gregory actually displays an almost criminal lack of imagination. They found Straker’s body in a muddy hollow with evidence of the horse being present. He then tells Holmes:
“I am afraid that there are no more tracks,” said the Inspector. “I have examined the ground very carefully for a hundred yards in each direction.”
Holmes and Watson, however, find hoof prints outside this radius, which seems quite logical. Unless Gregory has so much imagination that he thought the horse sprouted wings and flew away, it seems to me he should have reasoned that if I continue looking, I will find the horse’s prints.
Curious incident four: Holmes fails to examine Straker’s body. He asks Gregory:
“Straker was brought back here, I presume?”
“Yes; he lies upstairs [at Straker’s home near the stables]. The inquest is to-morrow.”
I should think that with Holmes intimate knowledge of the effects of pre- and post-mortem injuries (I direct you to the harpoon-wielding Holmes in Black Peter), he should have been able to distinguish between wounds left by the knob of a cane and those left by the hoof prints of a horse.
Curious incident five: Holmes leaves Silver Blaze with Silas Brown. Brown had found the horse wandering on the moor. He had first thought to return it to King’s Pyland, but thought better of it and decided to disguise the horse and keep it at his stables. Watson asks Holmes:
“But are you not afraid to leave the horse in his power now, since he has every interest in injuring it?”
“My dear fellow, he [Silas Brown] will guard it as the apple of his eye. He knows that his only hope of mercy is to produce it safe.”
It seems to me very irresponsible to leave Silver Blaze with Brown. It is in Brown’s best interests to either kill and dispose of the horse or to set it free. What proof has Holmes, other than the trail of hoof prints that he is withholding from Inspector Gregory and Colonel Ross?
Curious incident six: How is the Jockey Club to overlook that Ross ran another horse in place of Silver Blaze and then revealed that it was actually Silver Blaze in disguise? I cannot help think this shows intent to defraud and should I have betted against Silver Blaze, I would have protested. (Mike Newman, at a recent meeting of The Neglected Patients of Doctor Watson, wondered whether Lord Backwater ever asked his manager why they have an extra horse they’re transporting to Winchester for the Wessex Cup.)