THE TRAIN TO SELBY
The Meaning of Life
Whether It Be Fact or Fiction…
There are meetings which are arranged.
There are meetings which are accidental.
Then there are those exceedingly peculiar encounters which seem to have been arranged by someone who has neglected to leave either their name, address, or forwarding instructions.
This was one of those.
It began at precisely half past three on a wet November afternoon beneath the magnificent iron and glass roof of St Pancras Station.
London was behaving exactly as London generally does when it wishes to remind everyone of their place in the universe.
It was raining.
Not, dramatically.
Not, romantically.
Merely, persistently.
The sort of rain which does not inspire poets but does ruin hats.
Steam curled around the platforms. Porters shouted. Doors slammed. Whistles shrieked. Ladies hurried beneath umbrellas while gentlemen pretended not to notice that their trousers were becoming wet around the ankles.
Somewhere a child was crying.
Somewhere else a dog was barking.
Standing perfectly still amid this great mechanical confusion was Mr Sherlock Holmes.
He was examining a button.
This in itself was not unusual.
Sherlock Holmes had examined many buttons in his career and had frequently discovered that they were considerably more interesting than the people wearing them.
This particular button was brown.
Ordinary.
Horn.
Approximately, half an inch across.
It had arrived that morning inside an envelope bearing a Yorkshire postmark.
There had been no letter.
Only the button.
Holmes had looked at it for approximately eleven seconds before announcing:
“Watson, I must go to Selby.”
Dr Watson, who had been attempting to eat breakfast at the time, lowered his newspaper.
“Why?”
Holmes had already left the room.
So, several hours later, Sherlock Holmes stood upon the platform at St Pancras carrying one small leather case, a newspaper, his violin, and a mystery.
The mystery had been sent by an old school acquaintance named Edmund Blackwood.
They had not seen one another in nearly thirty years.
Blackwood had become a scholar, philosopher, collector of obscure manuscripts and, according to his last published article, something of an eccentric even by the generous standards of Victorian academia.
Three days earlier Holmes had received a telegram from him.
It contained only thirteen words.
HOLMES, I BELIEVE I HAVE DISCOVERED THE MEANING OF LIFE.
SOMEONE WANTS IT DESTROYED.
COME.
Holmes had initially assumed Blackwood had gone mad.
This did not particularly concern him.
Madness was common.
The meaning of life, on the other hand, was considerably rarer.
Then came the button.
Something about that button had changed his mind.
Holmes placed it carefully into his waistcoat pocket.
“Curious,” he murmured.
At that exact moment, approximately forty yards away, another gentleman stepped from a hansom cab.
Several people turned to look at him.
One woman stopped altogether.
The gentleman appeared to be no more than twenty-five.
Perhaps, twenty-seven.
Certainly, not thirty.
His skin was pale and perfect. His hair dark and beautifully arranged. His coat had been cut by a tailor whose prices were presumably calculated according to the national debt.
He moved with the leisurely confidence of a man who had never in his life wondered whether people were looking at him.
He knew they were.
Dorian Gray had been accustomed to being looked at for a very long time.
An impossibly long time.
He handed the porter his luggage.
“Selby.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Now take care with the black case.”
“Yes, sir.”
“I mean it.”
The porter glanced at the case.
It was small.
Locked.
Heavy.
For reasons he could not have explained, unpleasant.
“I shall guard it with my life, sir.”
Dorian smiled.
“I wouldn’t go quite that far.”
The porter laughed nervously.
Dorian did not.
He had decided that morning to leave London.
Again.
He had made similar decisions before.
Paris had occasionally been useful.
Venice had been entertaining.
Vienna had been dangerous.
Monte Carlo had been expensive.
Cairo had been wonderfully immoral.
But eventually London always drew him back.
London knew how to keep secrets.
More importantly, London understood hypocrisy.
It could condemn a man at breakfast, dine with him at eight, borrow money from him at eleven and discuss his disgrace over luncheon the following afternoon.
Dorian understood London perfectly.
Unfortunately, London had recently begun understanding Dorian rather too well.
There had been rumours.
There were always rumours.
Young men whose lives had changed after knowing him.
Women who refused to speak his name.
A diplomat who had shot himself.
An actress who had disappeared.
A gentleman found floating in the Thames.
Nothing had ever been proved.
Nothing ever would be.
But whispers are peculiar things.
Enough whispers eventually become a voice.
Dorian had decided that Yorkshire might provide something London could no longer offer.
Silence.
He owned an estate outside Selby inherited through a distant relative.
He had visited it only twice.
It was old.
Cold.
Remote.
Perfect.
There were no fashionable drawing rooms.
No gossip columns.
No acquaintances from twenty years earlier staring at his face and wondering why theirs had aged while his had not.
Most importantly, there was an attic.
Dorian had learned the value of attics.
He walked along the platform.
Then he saw Sherlock Holmes.
Dorian stopped.
Holmes did not look up.
Interesting, thought Dorian.
Most people looked.
Holmes continued reading his newspaper.
Dorian smiled faintly.
He knew who Holmes was.
Everybody knew.
The consulting detective had become an irritation to criminals throughout Britain and an entertainment to everyone else.
Dorian had occasionally wondered whether Holmes knew of him.
He hoped not.
Then Holmes spoke.
“You are blocking the platform.”
Dorian looked behind him.
There was ample space.
“Am I?”
“No.”
Dorian smiled.
“Then why say so?”
Holmes lowered his newspaper.
For the first time the two men looked directly at one another.
Something passed between them.
Recognition.
Not acquaintance.
Recognition.
The hunter recognising something that should perhaps be hunted.
The beautiful recognising something that could not be charmed by beauty.
Holmes’s eyes moved once over Dorian.
Shoes.
Cuffs.
Coat.
Hands.
Face.
Luggage.
Back to face.
Dorian felt an unfamiliar irritation.
“Mr Holmes.”
“Mr Gray.”
Dorian’s smile disappeared.
“So you know me.”
“I know of you.”
“Should I be flattered?”
“No.”
A whistle sounded.
“Passengers for York, Selby and points north!”
Holmes folded his newspaper.
Dorian watched him.
“How extraordinary,” Dorian said. “We appear to be travelling in the same direction.”
Holmes picked up his case.
“Most people at a railway station are.”
Just walked away.
Dorian stared after him.
Then, despite himself, laughed.
“Oh, I am going to enjoy you.”
He had no idea how wrong he was.
⸻
I.
THE CARRIAGE
First class offered certain advantages.
Privacy.
Comfort.
Better upholstery.
Generally speaking, protection from the majority of humanity.
Sherlock Holmes entered his reserved compartment and sat beside the window.
He preferred travelling backwards.
Watson had once asked why.
“Because I have already seen where I am going,” Holmes replied. “I am interested in where I have been.”
Watson had decided not to ask again.
Holmes placed his violin beside him.
The train shuddered.
Steam rolled past the window.
The door opened.
Dorian Gray appeared.
For perhaps the first time that afternoon, Holmes looked genuinely disappointed.
“You.”
“Me.”
“There are other compartments.”
“All occupied.”
“Unfortunate.”
“For which of us?”
“Yes.”
Dorian laughed and sat opposite him.
The whistle blew.
With a tremendous metallic sigh, the train began moving.
St Pancras slid away.
London began retreating.
For several minutes neither man spoke.
Holmes read.
Dorian watched him.
Holmes turned a page.
Dorian continued watching.
Another page.
Finally Holmes said:
“You are staring at me.”
“I was wondering what you see when you look at people.”
“Usually more than they wish.”
“Dangerous talent.”
“So is beauty.”
Dorian’s expression changed almost imperceptibly.
Holmes noticed.
Naturally.
“You consider beauty dangerous?”
“Anything capable of altering another person’s judgement is dangerous.”
“Money?”
“Certainly.”
“Power?”
“Obviously.”
“Religion?”
Holmes lowered the newspaper.
“Frequently.”
“Love?”
“Especially.”
Dorian leaned back.
“Oh, Mr Holmes. Perhaps this journey will not be tedious after all.”
“I had hoped it would be.”
“Do you always dislike conversation?”
“No. Only unnecessary conversation.”
“How do you determine what is necessary?”
“By whether it tells me something I did not already know.”
Dorian smiled.
“Then allow me to surprise you.”
Holmes looked at him.
“You are leaving London because you are frightened.”
Silence.
The wheels beat beneath them.
Dorian’s smile remained, but something behind it vanished.
“Am I?”
“Yes.”
“Of what?”
“That,” said Holmes, “I have not yet determined.”
Dorian slowly crossed one leg over the other.
“You deduced fear from my shoes, perhaps?”
“No.”
“My luggage?”
“Partly.”
“My expression?”
“Hardly. You have spent years ensuring your expression reveals nothing.”
Dorian’s fingers tightened.
Holmes continued.
“You are wealthy, accustomed to servants and ordinarily travel with considerable luggage. Today you carry comparatively little. Your clothing is fashionable but selected hurriedly. Your gloves do not match the walking stick. A man as fastidious as you does not make such mistakes unless distracted.”
Dorian glanced at his gloves.
Damn him.
“Your departure was sudden,” Holmes continued. “You purchased your ticket this afternoon. Your porter carries a small black case which you have looked towards seven times since entering this carriage.”
Dorian turned towards the corridor.
“Eight,” Holmes said.
Dorian looked back.
“You are very irritating.”
“I am frequently told so.”
“You have no idea what is in that case.”
“No.”
“Then your famous powers have limits.”
“Everything has limits.”
“Not everything.”
Holmes studied him.
There it was again.
Something.
A tiny fracture in the surface.
“You believe yourself an exception.”
Dorian smiled.
“My dear Mr Holmes, isn’t every man secretly convinced he is?”
“No. Most men secretly fear they are ordinary.”
“So are they?”
“Usually.”
Dorian laughed.
“You have a bleak view of humanity.”
“I have an observational view.”
“What is the difference?”
“Evidence.”
The countryside began appearing beyond the glass.
Factories.
Terraces.
Chimneys.
Then fields.
Dorian watched England passing.
“Tell me something, Holmes.”
“No.”
Dorian ignored him.
“What is the meaning of life?”
Holmes became completely still.
Dorian noticed.
Smiled.
“Interesting.”
Holmes folded his newspaper.
“Why did you ask that?”
“Why shouldn’t I?”
“Because out of the approximately fifty thousand questions available to you, you selected precisely the subject of my journey.”
For the first time Dorian appeared genuinely surprised.
“Your journey concerns the meaning of life?”
“Possibly.”
Dorian began laughing.
Not politely.
Not elegantly.
Really laughing.
Holmes watched him with mild annoyance.
“Forgive me,” Dorian said. “Sherlock Holmes, the great rationalist, travelling to Yorkshire to discover the meaning of life.”
“I am traveling to investigate a claim.”
“Which is?”
“That someone has discovered it.”
Dorian stopped laughing.
“Who?”
“Old acquaintance.”
“You believe him?”
“No.”
“Then why go?”
Holmes touched the pocket containing the button.
“Because something happened which makes his claim worthy of examination.”
Dorian leaned forward.
“Suppose he has discovered it?”
“Then I shall examine his evidence.”
“Good God, Holmes. Must everything have evidence?”
“Yes.”
“Beauty?”
“Yes.”
“Love?”
“Yes.”
“The Soul ?”
“Especially.”
Dorian looked out of the window.
“The Soul.”
Holmes watched him.
This time the reaction was unmistakable.
“Does that word trouble you, Mr Gray?”
“No.”
“You looked away.”
“I am admiring the countryside.”
“You have not looked at it once since we left London.”
Dorian turned back.
“Do you believe we have souls?”
“I have seen no reliable evidence.”
Dorian smiled sadly.
“I have.”
Somewhere beneath them, the wheels changed rhythm.
⸻
II.
THE PORTRAIT
Tea arrived at four thirty.
Dorian ordered champagne.
Holmes ordered coffee.
“You disapprove?” Dorian asked.
“Of champagne?”
“Of drinking at this hour.”
“I have injected cocaine before breakfast.”
Dorian stared at him.
Then burst out laughing.
“Holmes, you improve by the minute.”
“I am not attempting to.”
“That makes it considerably better.”
The champagne arrived.
Dorian raised his glass.
“To life.”
Holmes raised his coffee.
“To evidence.”
They drank.
Outside, afternoon began surrendering to evening.
Dorian examined his reflection in the window.
Still perfect.
Always perfect.
Holmes watched him.
“You look at yourself frequently.”
“Wouldn’t you?”
“No.”
“Perhaps if you had my face.”
“Perhaps if you had mine.”
Dorian grinned.
“I rather like you.”
“That makes one of us.”
“Do you never care what people think?”
“Only when what they think provides evidence.”
“About you?”
“About them.”
Dorian became thoughtful.
“That must be wonderfully freeing.”
“It is.”
“I have spent my entire life concerned with how people see me.”
“No.”
Holmes’s answer was immediate.
Dorian frowned.
“No?”
“You have spent your life controlling how people see you. That is entirely different.”
Silence.
Holmes continued drinking coffee.
Dorian’s voice became quieter.
“You really do see too much.”
“People reveal themselves constantly.”
“Even when they lie?”
“Especially when they lie.”
“Then what am I lying about?”
Holmes placed his cup down.
“Your age.”
Dorian froze.
“You appear approximately twenty-five. Yet your mannerisms belong to a man educated several decades ago. Your references are outdated. Earlier you referred to Lord Palmerston in the present tense before correcting yourself. Your watch was manufactured forty years ago and bears initials matching your own. It shows signs of continuous personal use.”
Dorian said nothing.
“You knew the original owner of a London club demolished before a man of your apparent age could have been born. You referred to him as ‘old Harry’ rather than Lord Henry. And when the porter mentioned the death of an elderly actress, you said, ‘She was beautiful when young,’ with the certainty of someone who had seen her.”
Holmes leaned back.
“Therefore either you are an unusually committed liar…”
Dorian whispered:
“Or?”
“Or you are considerably older than you appear.”
The train thundered north.
Dorian stared at him.
Then slowly smiled.
“Suppose I told you I was.”
“I would ask how.”
“Suppose I said magic?”
“I would ask again.”
“A Curse ?”
“Again.”
“A bargain?”
“With whom?”
Dorian laughed softly.
“There you are. Always another question.”
“That is how ignorance is reduced.”
“Happiness ?”
Holmes paused.
“Sometimes ignorance assists happiness.”
Dorian looked genuinely delighted.
“At last! A philosophical statement.”
“An observation.”
“Don’t spoil it.”
The train plunged briefly into a tunnel.
Darkness filled the carriage.
For several seconds only their reflections floated in the glass.
When daylight returned, Dorian said:
“There was a painting.”
Holmes waited.
“A portrait of a young man.”
“Yourself.”
Dorian looked at him sharply.
“You said there was a notorious painting kept in your attic. London rumours are rarely accurate in detail, but they are frequently useful in aggregate.”
Dorian poured another champagne.
“I wished to remain young.”
“A common wish.”
“Beautiful.”
“An even more common one.”
“ I did.”
Holmes’s expression did not change.
“The painting aged instead.”
Holmes said nothing.
“It changed with every cruelty. Every sin. Every corruption. Everything I did appeared upon that face while mine remained untouched.”
“You expect me to believe this?”
“No.”
“Good.”
“I merely wanted to see whether Sherlock Holmes could solve something impossible.”
“There are no impossible things.”
Dorian smiled.
“Now who believes himself exceptional?”
Holmes ignored this.
“Where is the painting?”
Dorian looked towards the corridor.
Holmes followed his gaze.
The black case.
“No,” Holmes said. “Too small.”
Dorian smiled.
“Very good.”
“You have something connected with it in the case.”
No answer.
“A fragment?”
Dorian’s smile vanished.
Holmes knew.
“A fragment,” he repeated.
Dorian whispered:
“I tried to destroy it.”
“But?”
“It bled.”
For once Sherlock Holmes had no immediate reply.
Dorian laughed bitterly.
“Nothing clever to say?”
“Several things. I am deciding which will annoy you least.”
“How considerate.”
“May I see it?”
“No.”
“Then why bring it?”
Dorian looked out into the gathering darkness.
“Because I cannot leave it behind.”
Holmes studied him.
“Perhaps it is not the painting you cannot leave behind.”
Dorian looked back.
“What, then?”
“Yourself.”
⸻
III.
THE MEANING OF LIFE
By six o’clock they had passed through a dozen subjects and agreed upon almost none.
Politics.
Religion.
Science.
Art.
Crime.
Sex.
Morality.
Death.
The British Empire.
Dorian considered morality largely an invention designed by unattractive people to inconvenience attractive ones.
Holmes considered that nonsense.
Dorian argued that virtue was frequently vanity wearing sensible shoes.
Holmes admitted this occasionally had merit.
Holmes suggested crime was usually banal.
Dorian insisted sin could be exquisite.
Holmes replied:
“Only to people who do not have to clean up afterwards.”
Dorian laughed so loudly that a gentleman in the next compartment complained.
Then came God.
“Do you believe in Him?” Dorian asked.
“The evidence is inconclusive.”
“Typical.”
“Do you?”
Dorian stared into his champagne.
“I believe somebody should be held responsible.”
Holmes almost smiled.
“For what?”
Dorian gestured towards the window.
“All this.”
“Yorkshire?”
“Existence.”
“A rather broad indictment.”
“Look at us, Holmes.
We are born without permission.
Given appetites we are told to resist.
Given bodies designed to decay.
Given people to love who will inevitably die.
Then we are punished for being unhappy about the arrangement.”
“That assumes punishment.”
“Doesn’t life punish everyone eventually?”
“No. Life happens. Humans interpret.”
“You really are insufferable.”
“So Watson tells me.”
“Who is Watson?”
“My friend.”
Dorian smiled.
“A friend. Sherlock Holmes has a friend.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Holmes frowned.
“What an extraordinary question.”
“Not at all. Friendship is irrational. It compromises judgement.
Creates vulnerability. Causes grief.”
Holmes looked through the window.
“Yes.”
“Yet?”
“Yet !!.”
Dorian waited.
Holmes did not continue.
Dorian smiled.
“There. The great detective has encountered something he cannot explain.”
“I can explain friendship perfectly well.”
“But not why it matters.”
Holmes turned towards him.
“Can you?”
Dorian’s smile slowly faded.
“No.”
For perhaps the first time, they understood one another.
Not completely.
But enough.
The train continued north.
After several minutes Holmes said:
“Perhaps that is your problem.”
“My problem?”
“You have mistaken duration for life.”
Dorian’s face hardened.
“Explain.”
“You have remained young. That is not the same as remaining alive.”
“I have lived more than most men.”
“You have experienced more.”
“Is there a difference?”
“Enormous.”
Dorian stared.
Holmes continued.
“You collect sensations. Beauty. Pleasure. Scandal. Danger. Admiration. People.
But collecting experiences, is no more living than collecting butterflies makes one a butterfly.”
“That is remarkably poetic for you.”
“I dislike waste.”
“So you, Holmes?
Do you live?”
Holmes stopped.
Dorian leaned forward.
“Come now. Fair is fair.”
Holmes said nothing.
“You solve crimes. You pursue mysteries. You observe everyone around you.
But do you actually participate?”
Holmes’s eyes narrowed.
Dorian had found the opening.
“You speak of my life as though yours is somehow richer.
But you hide behind intellect exactly as I hide behind beauty.”
Holmes remained silent.
“You study emotions instead of feeling them.”
Silence.
“You analyze love.”
Silence.
“You classify grief.”
Silence.
“You observe humanity from behind glass.”
Silence.
Dorian smiled.
“My Dear Holmes.”
He raised his champagne.
“We are much more alike than you would care to admit.”
Holmes looked at him for a long time.
Then:
“No.”
Dorian’s smile widened.
“Convincing.”
“The difference is simple.”
“Which is?”
“I know what I am hiding from.”
Dorian stopped smiling.
The train roared into darkness.
⸻
IV.
DEATH
Night had fallen completely.
The window now reflected the carriage rather than the countryside.
Two men faced one another.
One who could uncover almost any secret.
One who had spent his life becoming one.
Dinner was brought.
Soup.
Beef.
Potatoes.
Pudding.
Dorian ate little.
Holmes ate efficiently.
“How do you imagine you will die?” Dorian asked.
Holmes continued cutting his beef.
“I don’t.”
“Never?”
“No.”
“You aren’t afraid?”
“Fear is useful when danger is present. Otherwise it is imagination wasting energy.”
Dorian stared at him.
“That may be the most depressing thing you’ve said.”
“It is also true.”
“I think about death constantly.”
“Because you have avoided it.”
Dorian’s knife stopped.
Holmes continued:
“The ordinary man knows he will die. Therefore he eventually learns to ignore it.
You have spent decades attempting to escape death.
So death has become the central fact of your existence.”
Dorian put down his knife.
“That is absurd.”
“Is it?”
“Yes.”
“Then why are you carrying part of the portrait?”
Dorian said nothing.
“Why flee London?”
Nothing.
“Why Yorkshire?”
Dorian looked at him.
Holmes’s eyes sharpened.
“There is something at your estate.”
Dorian remained silent.
“Something you believe can destroy the portrait.”
Still nothing.
Holmes leaned forward.
“Therefore destroy you.”
Dorian whispered:
“You are frightening.”
“No. I am correct.”
“You know nothing.”
“I know enough.”
Dorian stood suddenly.
“Then deduce this.”
He opened the carriage door and disappeared into the corridor.
Holmes remained seated.
He finished his potato.
“Dramatic,”he murmured.
Five minutes passed.
Ten.
At fifteen, Holmes rose.
Not because Dorian had left.
Because the black case had gone with him.
Holmes stepped into the corridor.
The train swayed beneath his feet.
He moved towards the rear.
One carriage.
Then another.
He found Dorian standing on the open observation platform.
Cold wind tore at his coat.
Dark countryside rushed past.
Dorian held the black case.
“Planning to throw it away?” Holmes shouted.
“I’ve tried.”
“But ?”
“It comes back.”
“Nonsense.”
“Would you like to see?”
“Yes.”
Dorian opened the case.
Inside lay a piece of canvas.
Approximately eight inches square.
Holmes stared.
It depicted an eye.
A human eye.
Old.
Yellowed.
Corrupted.
Unmistakably alive.
It moved.
Sherlock Holmes did something exceedingly rare.
He stepped backwards.
Dorian laughed.
“Evidence enough?”
Holmes stared.
The eye on the canvas stared back.
“What mechanism?”
“No mechanism.”
“Chemical treatment?”
“No.”
“Optical illusion?”
“No.”
Holmes reached towards it.
“Don’t.”
Holmes stopped.
“Why?”
“It doesn’t like being touched.”
“Paintings do not possess preferences.”
“This one does.”
The eye moved towards Holmes.
He stared at it.
For several seconds neither man spoke.
Then Holmes whispered:
“Extraordinary.”
Dorian smiled.
“There may be hope for you yet.”
Holmes examined the canvas from every angle.
“No visible mechanism.”
“I told you.”
“That does not make it supernatural.”
“What would?”
“I don’t know.”
Dorian looked delighted.
“Sherlock Holmes just said, I don’t know.’”
“Yes.”
“Say it again.”
“No.”
Dorian laughed.
Then the eye blinked.
Holmes stopped.
The laughter vanished.
From somewhere within the canvas came a whisper.
Dorian.
Both men heard it.
Holmes’s face changed.
Not fear.
Something far rarer.
Wonder.
The portrait whispered again.
Dorian.
Dorian closed the case.
His hands were shaking.
Holmes noticed.
“Now,” Dorian said quietly, “perhaps we can discuss the soul.”
⸻
V.
WHAT ARE WE FOR?
They returned to their compartment.
Neither ordered another drink.
Holmes sat silently for nearly ten minutes.
Dorian enjoyed every second.
Eventually:
“I cannot explain it.”
Dorian grinned.
“Again.”
“Don’t push your luck.”
“I have waited decades to hear a rational man admit reality may be irrational.”
“I admitted only that I lack sufficient information.”
“Baby steps.”
Holmes ignored him.
The train continued towards Selby.
“What does it feel like?” Holmes asked.
“What?”
“Knowing your soul exists outside your body.”
Dorian looked surprised.
“I don’t know whether it is my soul.”
“What do you think it is?”
“My truth.”
Holmes considered this.
Dorian continued.
“Perhaps that is worse.”
“How?”
“A soul may be forgiven. Truth merely is.”
Holmes leaned back.
“That is almost intelligent.”
“Careful, I may blush.”
“You haven’t blushed naturally in forty years.”
Dorian stared.
Holmes smiled faintly.
“You really are a bastard.”
“So I am occasionally informed.”
Dorian began laughing.
Then Holmes laughed too.
Only briefly.
But enough.
Two impossible men, traveling through the English night.
One, carrying a violin.
The other carrying his sins in a suitcase.
“What do you think we’re for?” Dorian asked.
Holmes looked puzzled.
“Human beings.”
“I understood the noun.”
“What is our purpose?”
“Biologically?”
“No.”
“Socially?”
“No.”
“Then the question is badly formed.”
“Holmes!”
“You assume purpose exists.”
“Doesn’t it?”
“Why should it?”
Dorian stared.
“That is terrifying.”
“I find it liberating.”
“How?”
“If life arrives with a predetermined purpose,
we are servants executing instructions.”
“Without one?”
“We choose.”
Dorian became quiet.
Holmes continued.
“Perhaps the meaning of life is not something hidden waiting to be discovered.”
“But your friend believes he discovered it.”
“My friend may be wrong.”
“Then why are we traveling to him?”
“Because being wrong intelligently is frequently more useful than being right accidentally.”
Dorian laughed.
“I shall steal that.”
“You have stolen enough.”
The laughter stopped.
Holmes continued:
“You asked what humans are for. Perhaps that is the wrong question.”
“What is the right one?”
“What will you do with the fact that you exist?”
Dorian looked out at the darkness.
“That sounds suspiciously like free will.”
“Yes.”
“I don’t like free will.”
“Why?”
“Because then everything becomes my fault.”
Holmes said nothing.
There it was.
At last.
Not the painting.
Not immortality.
Not beauty.
Not corruption.
The real secret of Dorian Gray.
Responsibility.
Dorian understood.
“You bastard.”
“Again, yes.”
“You manoeuvred me there.”
“You walked there yourself.”
Dorian stood and paced the compartment.
“All those people.”
Holmes watched.
“All those years.”
“Yes.”
“All those things.”
“Yes.”
“Stop saying yes!”
“No.”
Dorian turned.
For the first time that evening he looked his true age.
Not physically.
Something deeper.
A century of exhaustion had suddenly appeared behind his beautiful eyes.
“What if there is no forgiveness?”
Holmes answered quietly.
“Then behave differently anyway.”
Dorian stared at him.
“That simple?”
“No.”
“That easy?”
“Certainly not.”
“Then why?”
“Because tomorrow’s action does not require yesterday’s permission.”
Dorian sat.
Neither spoke.
Outside, Yorkshire waited.
⸻
VI.
BLACKWOOD
The train began slowing.
Holmes checked his watch.
“Twenty minutes.”
“To Selby?”
“Yes.”
Dorian looked suddenly uneasy.
Holmes noticed.
“You are afraid again.”
“I am not.”
“You are.”
“Stop doing that.”
“No.”
Dorian looked at the black case.
“What if your friend really has discovered the meaning of life?”
“Then I suspect humanity will ignore him.”
Dorian laughed.
“Why?”
“Human beings have been told repeatedly to be kind to one another.
They have constructed entire religions around the idea and
then spent centuries killing one another over the precise wording.”
Dorian nearly choked laughing.
“Holmes!”
“An observation.”
“You may be the most cynical man alive.”
“Hardly. Cynics are disappointed idealists. I merely collect data.”
“You care.”
Holmes looked at him.
Dorian smiled.
“You do.”
“About what?”
“People.”
“Don’t be absurd.”
“You wouldn’t chase murderers if you didn’t.”
“I enjoy puzzles.”
“No. You could solve mathematical problems at home.”
Holmes looked away.
“You care about justice.”
“Justice is a social mechanism.”
“You care about Watson.”
Holmes’s jaw tightened.
“You care what happens to strangers.”
No answer.
Dorian leaned forward.
“You hide your humanity behind logic because humanity frightens you.”
Holmes looked back.
“Whereas you hide yours behind beauty.”
Dorian nodded.
“Touché.”
They sat quietly.
The train began slowing further.
Lights appeared outside.
Small villages.
Houses.
Warm windows.
Families at tables.
Lives occurring anonymously.
Dorian watched them.
“I envy them.”
“Who?”
“Ordinary people.”
“Earlier you seemed contemptuous of them.”
“I was.”
“What changed?”
“I met you.”
Holmes grimaced.
“Please don’t become sentimental.”
“Heaven forbid.”
A whistle sounded.
Dorian suddenly said:
“Come with me after you finish your business.”
“Where?”
“My estate.”
“Why?”
“I want to show you the portrait.”
Holmes looked at him.
“The whole portrait?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Dorian hesitated.
“Because I think I want to destroy it.”
“You said you tried.”
“I think I tried to destroy the evidence.”
Holmes waited.
Dorian swallowed.
“Perhaps this time I want to destroy what it represents.”
Holmes stared at him.
“That may kill you.”
“Yes.”
“You’re prepared for that?”
“No.”
Holmes nodded.
“Good.”
“Good?”
“Courage without fear is merely stupidity.”
Dorian smiled.
“You really should write greeting cards.”
“I would rather be shot.”
⸻
VII.
SELBY
The train pulled into Selby beneath a black Yorkshire sky.
Steam covered the platform.
Doors opened.
Passengers descended.
Holmes stepped onto the platform first.
Dorian followed.
His porter placed the black case beside him.
At the far end stood a solitary figure.
An elderly man.
Tall.
Thin.
Grey-haired.
Edmund Blackwood.
Holmes immediately knew something was wrong.
He walked towards him.
“Blackwood.”
The old man smiled.
“Sherlock.”
“You’ve aged.”
“So have you.”
“Less gracefully.”
“Still an arrogant swine.”
“Yes.”
Blackwood looked at Dorian.
“Who is this?”
“Dorian Gray.”
The old man’s face changed.
Not recognition.
Shock.
He stared.
“Dorian Gray?”
Dorian bowed slightly.
“Unfortunately.”
Blackwood looked at Holmes.
“You brought him?”
“No.”
“Then how…?”
Holmes frowned.
“How what?”
Blackwood whispered:
“This changes everything.”
Holmes’s eyes narrowed.
“What changes?”
Blackwood looked around the platform.
“Not here.”
“Why?”
“Because I was wrong.”
“About the meaning of life?”
“No.”
Blackwood stared directly at Dorian.
“About who it was meant for.”
Dorian became pale.
Holmes stepped between them.
“Explain.”
Blackwood looked towards the black case.
Then back at Dorian.
“The manuscript I found is four hundred years old.”
“So?”
“It describes a portrait.”
Silence.
Dorian stopped breathing.
Holmes said quietly:
“What portrait?”
Blackwood’s voice trembled.
“One that carries the corruption of its owner so that the body may remain unchanged.”
The station seemed suddenly silent.
Dorian whispered:
“Impossible.”
Holmes glanced at him.
“You have had quite enough experience with that word to stop using it.”
Blackwood continued:
“The manuscript says the portrait cannot be destroyed by its owner.”
Dorian stared.
“Then who?”
Blackwood looked at Holmes.
“The man who sees the truth but does not judge it.”
Holmes’s face changed.
Dorian whispered:
“You.”
Holmes looked from Blackwood to Dorian.
“No.”
Blackwood nodded.
“Yes.”
“The meaning of life?”
Blackwood smiled sadly.
“That was never written in the manuscript.”
Holmes stiffened.
“You lied to me.”
“I needed you here.”
“Why?”
“Because you would never have come for a soul.”
Holmes stared at him.
Blackwood smiled.
“But you would come for a mystery.”
Dorian began laughing.
Slowly, at first.
Then uncontrollably.
Holmes turned.
“I fail to see the humour.”
Dorian could barely speak.
“The world’s greatest detective has been tricked by philosophy.”
Holmes looked murderous.
Blackwood joined the laughter.
Even the porter smiled despite understanding absolutely nothing.
Holmes stood beneath the station lamps, offended by the universe.
Then something extraordinary happened.
He laughed.
Once.
Short.
Sharp.
Human.
Dorian stared.
Holmes immediately stopped.
“Never mention that.”
“Too late.”
“I mean it.”
“I shall treasure it forever.”
“That may be considerably shorter than you imagine.”
⸻
VIII.
THE ANSWER
They stood beneath the station clock.
Three men.
One mystery.
One impossible portrait.
One question humanity had been asking since it first
became intelligent enough to realise it was going to die.
Blackwood looked at Holmes.
“You still want the answer?”
“Yes.”
“There isn’t one.”
Holmes frowned.
Dorian laughed.
“We travelled all this way for that?”
“No,” Blackwood said. “There is no single meaning of life.”
“Then what did you discover?”
Blackwood looked at them.
“That we keep asking the Universe a question it never promised to answer.”
Holmes became still.
Blackwood continued.
“We ask, ‘Why am I here?’
as though existence were a railway ticket with the destination printed upon it.”
Dorian looked down the tracks.
“Rather appropriate.”
“We want instructions. Purpose. Destiny. Someone to blame.
Someone to thank. We invent Gods, Philosophies, Empires, Fortunes, Reputations.
We chase Youth.”
He looked at Dorian.
“We chase certainty.”
He looked at Holmes.
“All the while life is happening.”
A train whistle sounded somewhere far away.
Blackwood smiled.
“Perhaps life isn’t a riddle.”
Holmes said:
“Everything is a riddle.”
“No, Sherlock. Perhaps that is your mistake.”
Holmes stared.
“Perhaps life is an experience.”
Dorian whispered:
“So the meaning?”
Blackwood shrugged.
“You give it one.”
Silence.
Dorian looked almost disappointed.
“That’s it?”
“What were you expecting?”
“Something grander.”
“Humans always do.”
Holmes looked around the station.
Porters carried luggage.
A mother held her daughter’s hand.
A soldier kissed his wife.
An old man searched for his spectacles while they sat upon his head.
A dog enthusiastically investigated a wastebasket.
Life.
Not particularly Grand.
Not particularly Tidy.
Certainly, not logical.
But there it was.
Holmes looked at Dorian.
“What meaning did you give yours?”
Dorian looked at the black case.
“Pleasure.”
“Was it enough?”
“No.”
“Beauty?”
“No.”
“Immortality?”
Dorian smiled sadly.
“Definitely not.”
“What now?”
Dorian thought.
Then he looked at Holmes.
“I haven’t the faintest idea.”
Holmes smiled.
“Excellent.”
“Why excellent?”
“Because now you can begin.”
Blackwood picked up his bag.
“Gentlemen?”
They walked towards the station exit.
Dorian paused.
“Holmes?”
“Yes?”
“Do you think I can change?”
Holmes looked at him.
Not as detective to suspect.
Not as Rationalist to Impossibility.
Not even as one fictional legend to another.
Simply as one human being to another.
“I don’t know.”
Dorian smiled faintly.
“At least you’re honest.”
Holmes continued:
“But change is not a matter of deserving the opportunity.”
Dorian waited.
“It is what you do with it.”
They stepped outside.
Yorkshire rain greeted them immediately.
Dorian looked upward.
“You’ve brought me to the North and it’s raining.”
Holmes pulled up his collar.
“A Remarkable Deduction.”
“I hate Yorkshire.”
“You’ve been here three minutes.”
“Long enough.”
Blackwood laughed.
A carriage waited.
They climbed inside.
As it began moving,
Dorian looked back towards Selby Station.
London seemed very far away.
His crimes had not disappeared.
His past had not been forgiven.
The portrait still existed.
Death still waited.
Nothing had been solved.
Yet…
Something had changed.
Perhaps that was the problem with humanity.
We expect revelation to arrive with trumpets.
Lightning.
Burning bushes.
Angels.
Great celestial announcements.
Perhaps it arrives instead in a railway carriage.
Opposite a stranger.
Over bad coffee.
Between two people who disagree about almost everything.
Perhaps the meaning of life is not written somewhere among the Stars.
Perhaps there is no secret sentence.
No, cosmic password.
No final answer hidden behind the curtain.
Perhaps we are born.
We arrive.
Confused.
Naked.
Screaming.
Entirely without instructions.
Then somebody gives us a name.
Someone loves us.
Someone hurts us.
We hurt somebody else.
We make mistakes.
We make more mistakes.
Occasionally we learn from them.
Frequently we don’t.
We fall in Love.
Fall out of Love.
Find friends.
Lose Friends.
Build things.
Destroy Things.
Laugh at Funerals.
Cry at Weddings.
Waste Tuesday afternoons worrying about Thursday.
Spend half our lives wishing we were younger
and the other half wishing we had known then what we know now.
We chase money.
Beauty.
Power.
Recognition.
Immortality.
Certainty.
Eventually we discover that none of them can purchase another yesterday.
Perhaps that is why life matters.
Because it ends.
Perhaps Dorian’s curse was never that the portrait aged.
Perhaps his curse was that he didn’t.
He had escaped the very thing that gives moments value.
Their disappearance.
A rose matters because it wilts.
Childhood matters because it passes.
A kiss matters because lips eventually part.
A friendship matters because one day one chair will be empty.
Life matters because somewhere, someday, inevitably…
The train reaches the final station.
Perhaps Sherlock Holmes had spent his life solving mysteries because somewhere inside that magnificent analytical brain he understood something even he could not reduce to evidence:
People matter.
Watson mattered.
Mrs Hudson mattered.
The frightened client sitting beside the fire mattered.
The nameless murdered man mattered.
Justice mattered.
Truth mattered.
Perhaps Dorian Gray had spent his life running from precisely the same discovery.
Other people matter.
Which, is inconvenient.
Messy.
Painful.
Absolutely, fatal to selfishness.
The carriage rolled through the Yorkshire darkness.
Blackwood fell asleep.
Holmes looked through the window.
Dorian sat opposite him.
“Holmes?”
“Yes?”
“I think I know the meaning of life.”
Holmes sighed.
“We have been through this.”
“No. Really.”
“Very well.”
Dorian smiled.
“To leave something better than you found it.”
Holmes considered this.
“A Room?”
“If Necessary.”
“A Country?”
“Preferably.”
“A Person?”
“Especially.”
Holmes looked out of the window again.
“That is not the meaning of life.”
Dorian frowned.
“What is it, then?”
Holmes closed his eyes.
“To keep asking.”
Dorian smiled.
Two answers.
Neither provable.
Both possibly correct.
Which is rather irritating.
But then so is life.
The carriage disappeared into the darkness.
Somewhere inside the black case, an ancient painted eye slowly closed.
For the first time in decades…
Dorian Gray did not look at his reflection.
He looked out of the window.
At the World.
⸻
EPILOGUE
Dr Watson received a telegram the following morning.
It read:
WATSON. DELAYED IN YORKSHIRE. CASE COMPLICATED.
MET DORIAN GRAY. DO NOT BELIEVE ANYTHING NEWSPAPERS REPORT.
H.
Watson read it twice.
Then called for breakfast.
Mrs Hudson entered.
“Anything Wrong, Doctor?”
Watson folded the telegram.
“Holmes has apparently gone to Yorkshire to investigate the meaning of life.”
Mrs Hudson placed the toast upon the table.
“Has he now?”
“Yes.”
“Well, I could have saved him the fare.”
Watson stared at her.
“You know the meaning of life?”
“Certainly.”
“What is it?”
Mrs Hudson looked at him as though the answer were perfectly obvious.
“Try not to be a bloody nuisance while you’re here.”
She left.
Watson stared after her.
Then slowly smiled.
He picked up his pen.
He wrote:
It was in the winter of 189 …
that my friend Mr Sherlock Holmes undertook what I can only describe as the strangest investigation of his remarkable career…
Whether the events which followed were fact or fiction, I shall leave entirely to the reader.
Holmes would demand evidence.
Dorian would demand beauty.
Blackwood would demand meaning.
Mrs Hudson, being considerably wiser than all three…
Would simply demand that they wipe their feet before coming inside.
Then perhaps…
Just perhaps…
She had solved the mystery after all.
THE END
Or, considering the subject…
PERHAPS NOT !!!
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