The Speckled Band

Helen Stoner comes to Baker Street with a reasonable complaint and a terrible one. Her stepfather, Dr Grimesby Roylott, is moving her into the room where her sister Julia slept, and Julia died in that room just before her wedding, mysteriously and suddenly. Worse, Helen has heard the whistle again, the same curious whistle she heard on the night her sister died. Holmes does not need a second visit to know the danger is real. She is frightened and she is sure, and Holmes takes both seriously.

Roylott is the sort of villain who does not trouble to hide his temper. Jeremy Kemp plays him with a bluster that makes the violence underneath feel close, and the family estate becomes a claustrophobic stage for the whole affair. Holmes lays his plan with the care of a man who expects the worst, and the episode lets the trap spring at its own pace. The answer turns on that whistle and on something Holmes refuses to name to Helen. Fans know what the speckled band turns out to be, and it still lands.

Rosalyn Landor's Helen is frightened without being helpless, and Denise Armon gets the smaller part of Julia. Rosalie Williams is Mrs Hudson, keeping the home fires steady while everyone else is on edge. John Bruce directs, with the script credited to John Hawkesworth, Jeremy Paul and Arthur Conan Doyle. Stephen Mallatratt, Tim Condren and John Gill fill the remaining roles. Michael Cox produced, with music by Patrick Gowers and cinematography by Ken Morgan.

This is one of the most famous of all the Holmes stories, and the Granada version does it properly. The terror is quiet and domestic. It is entirely believable. The whistle is the detail that matters, small and ordinary. And Roylott is a monster who thinks he has thought of everything, which makes watching Holmes disagree all the sweeter.