Eileen Hudson and her husband, Tom, had taken up residence with the famous detective fifteen years earlier, when he had retired from his Baker Street lodgings to pursue the hobby of bee-keeping here at Sussex Downs.

Mrs Hudson lifted the bowl from the tray and tried without success to make the great detective swallow a few spoonfuls.

“Come on now, Mr Holmes, you really must try to eat something,” she coaxed, as though talking to a naughty child, however, her tone was more plea than admonition.

She tried to feed Holmes, without success, for a few moments, before turning to Dr Watson to say, “You really must try to get him to eat something Doctor.”

Watson looked up startled and muttered, “What?   Oh yes, yes, of course, Mrs Hudson.   I will see what I can do.”

Mrs Hudson retired from the room and Dr Watson took over the task of trying to persuade the great detective to eat.

For a few moments there was a calm, and so I took the opportunity to study the other three men more closely.   Sherlock Holmes was very tall, perhaps six foot three, deathly thin, with the famous beak nose which had been chronicled so faithfully by Watson and Conan Doyle, and was almost grey-skinned with age.   Dr Watson was nearly a foot shorter than his long time companion, and very much overweight, although no-doubt if brought to task over it he would insist that he was the ideal weight for a man of his age, and wore a thick, bushy, grey moustache, as did Sir Arthur.   Like Holmes, Conan Doyle was considerably taller than Watson, but not nearly so thin as Holmes, although he was far from stout.   All three men had short, grey hair, as did I myself, although I was no more than forty years of age at the time.

Things had quietened down, and for a moment it seemed as though Dr Watson were going to succeed where Mrs Hudson had failed.   But then Sherlock Holmes began to thrash his arms about like a man possessed, and knocked the bowl of soup out of Watson’s hands, coating the bed, Watson, and the nearly new floral carpet with chicken broth.

“Watson!   Watson!” called out Holmes in a feeble voice.