Sherlock Holmes meets Laurel and Hardy

This is  a slight re-write of an earlier piece, Posting it again because...well, just because!!

The Laurel and Hardy Incident

            When I glance over my increasingly copious notes and records of some of the cases that my good friend, Mr Sherlock Holmes has been involved in to some degree, I am faced by a surprising amount that are out of the commonplace and present so many singular, strange features that it is no easy task for this humble chronicler to decide just which narratives to put before the public.

            The incident I am about to relate involved no known crime and the puzzle, although trivial, it presented to Holmes had no solution nor in fact required one. Yet it begs to be recalled as one of those whimsical moments that can occur when six million people are jostling together in a great metropolis.

            We had both broken our fast early for the heat in our Baker Street rooms was stifling. The morning sunshine bathed the street in a golden hue, the light danced and dappled its way down the thoroughfare. The morning murmur of the city coming to life was now bursting into a symphony of noise. A paean to the rich, varied life that abounds in London.

            Holmes was busy reading The Times and I was attempting to write up the case of The Gondolier and the Russian Countess when we heard the doorbell, followed moments later by hurried footsteps ascending the seventeen steps.

            Holmes looked up from the agony column which had been occupying his attention.

            ‘Two men, Watson, one certainly taller and larger framed than the other, but even so just as nimble and fleet of foot as his companion.’           ‘I had no time to indulge Holmes’s deduction with my usual ‘How?’ for the door opened wide and two men, such as Holmes had described entered the room. The larger of the two men, who towered over his companion was the first to speak.

            ‘Pardon me, gentlemen for the intrusion, but we appear to be lost.’

            ‘Yes that’s right and we don’t know where we are either,’ announced his friend.

            ‘You are in Baker Street,’ I stated.

            ‘Baker Street where, sir?’ asked the ample proportioned one.

            ‘In London of course. Do you not know even what city you are in?’

            ‘London? London?’ He turned to his thin friend. ‘Well, here’s another nice mess you’ve gotten me into.’

            His response was to burst into tears. ‘I didn’t mean to…I couldn’t help it….I only touched the button.’

            ‘You can’t leave anything alone can you? Pardon me, gentlemen, allow me to explain.’

            ‘Yes, please do,’ said Holmes, ‘for beyond the obvious facts that you are both down on your luck, have both been in the US Navy, have bought a boat recently, have wives who hen-peck you and are regularly harassed by a balding Scotsman, I assure you I know nothing about you whatsoever.’

            ‘Say, does this guy know us, Ollie?’

            ‘He most certainly does not and don’t call me Ollie. Gentlemen, I am Oliver Norvell Hardy and this my friend, Mr Laurel.’

            ‘My name is Sherlock Holmes and this is my friend and colleague Doctor Watson. Now pleases explain, if you can, the nature of your predicament.’

            ‘Well, it’s like this. We were sweeping a chimney at the home of a mad scientist and he asked us not to touch a particular machine he was working on. Stanley accidentally pressed one of the buttons, pulled four levers, turned three dials and engaged six of the gears and now we find ourselves in another country.’

            ‘I just wanted to know the time,’ said Mr Laurel.

            ‘Then why did you have to interfere with the machine?’

            ‘He said it was a time machine, recomember? Say, did you say another country, Ollie? Is this London, England?’

            ‘Why, certainly,’ Mr Hardy replied.

            ‘That’s swell. I had an uncle once who was building a house in London, but he died.’

            ‘I’m sorry to hear that Mr Laurel, what did he die of?’ I asked.

            ‘A Tuesday or was it a Wednesday,’ he replied, taking off his hat and ruffling his hair so that it stood on end.

            ‘No, my dear fellow. I meant what caused his death?’

            ‘He fell through a trapdoor and broke his neck.’

            ‘While building his house?’

            ‘No, they were hanging him.’

            I looked at Holmes intently, hoping to convey to him a silent message that one of us should make an excuse to leave and bring back the nearest constable for clearly we were in the presence of two lunatic who have escaped from Colney Hatch asylum. To my surprise, he was laughing in that peculiar silent fashion of his and was displaying no alarm at all.

            ‘Do you have often get into scrapes like this?’ he asked.

            ‘No, I reckon this is our first mistake since that fellow sold us the Brooklyn Bridge.’

            ‘That was no mistake, Stan. That bridge is going to be worth a lot of money to us one day.’

            ‘Well, gentlemen,’ Holmes said, his eyes twinkling merrily. ‘I have a reputation for solving the most abstruse cryptograms, puzzles and conundrums, but I fear that this particular problem is beyond even my powers.’

            ‘Say, Ollie, I have an idea.’

            Mr Hardy’s face bore a look of complete and utter amazement at this remark from Mr Laurel.

            ‘You do?’

            ‘Sure, I’m not as dumb as you look.’

            ‘You certainly are not,’ replied Mr Hardy, twiddling his bow tie. ‘We will leave you in peace gentlemen. Come, Stanley.’

            ‘Goodbye,’ shouted Mr Laurel as they left.

            ‘Good day to you both,’ I called after them.

            ‘Quick, Watson. There is not a moment to lose, we must run after them.’

            I was most gratified to hear that Holmes had not been taken in by our visitors and had seen them for the madmen they were.

            ‘If we are to overcome then, Holmes, shall I bring the police-whistle to attract the nearest bobby?’

            ‘Overcome them? I have no intention of doing so nor asking the assistance of the police.’

            ‘I do not understand. Then, why pray, we going after them at all?’

            ‘Elementary, my dear fellow. I have not laughed like this for a long time. Come, Watson.’