The Dying Detective

A man dies suddenly of a tropical fever that nobody in London has ever seen, except for one man. That man is Culverton Smith, the dead man's cousin and heir, and the world's only authority on the disease. Smith calls it a tragedy. Holmes suspects it is a murder, which puts him in an awkward position, because the only way to prove it is to get Smith to talk.

So Holmes, who has never been a good patient, becomes a magnificent one. He takes to his bed at Baker Street, refuses food and light, sends Watson away when his old friend tries to examine him, and announces that he is dying. Watson is convinced this time is real. Mrs Hudson is distraught. But only Holmes knows that the whole performance is for one audience member, and that the audience member has not yet arrived.

The episode plays out like a stage piece, and it is the better for it. Everything happens in one sickroom, between two men, while a confession waits in the wings. Smith arrives to gloat over a dying rival, and Holmes lets him. The trap closes the way Holmes always intends his traps to close, with the villain saying more than he meant to say to a man he thought was beyond hearing.

T.R. Bowen wrote it, Sarah Hellings directed. Jonathan Hyde is Culverton Smith, and he makes the man's smugness a pleasure to hate. Susannah Harker is Adelaide Savage, Hugh Bonneville is Victor Savage, the dead man, and Roy Hudd plays John Gedgrave, who also answers to Frank Carter. Rosalie Williams is Mrs Hudson, with T.R. Bowen himself as Charles Damant, John Labanowski as Inspector Morton and Rowland Davies as Colonel Carnac. Jeremy Brett and Edward Hardwicke are the centre of it all, and Brett's performance as the dying detective is the best reason to watch.

The Dying Detective is Holmes at his most theatrical, and the series knows it. He spends the whole episode acting, and he is so good at it that even the audience almost believes him.