The Disappearance of Sherlock Holmes: A Mystery Featuring Shadwell Rafferty Hardcover - 2002

by Larry Millett

Sherlock Holmes Disappears, Foul Play Suspected reads a New York headline. So begins the fifth mystery in Larry Millett's series, which takes Holmes on a chase across continents and on a labyrinthine journey into a dangerous and sinister mind. Only with the assistance of his large-hearted and amply proportioned old friend, Irish saloonkeeper Shadwell Rafferty, will the score be settled and justice delivered.

A letter, written in a secret cipher he recognizes all too well, tells the celebrated sleuth that Abe Slaney, the vicious murderer he once captured after a duel of wits, seems to have risen from the grave. And there is no time to waste. The beautiful woman for whom Slaney once killed is being held for ransom. But when it transpires that he-or someone-has presumed to impersonate Holmes himself, the great sleuth begins to glimpse a darker business than he expected. In desperate pursuit from London to New York to Chicago-from a foggy rendezvous in Lower Manhattan to a wild foray with Rafferty into the Windy City's underworld-Holmes soon has cause to wonder whether he will escape his captors or be framed for the crime himself.