The Problem of The Man

Con was in a mess. He was always in a mess. Only this time, he was in a bigger mess than usual.

True, he reflected, growing up things hadn’t been so bad for him. He had gone to school just like everyone else; he had attended university and got his M.A. But once he was set loose into the world to fend for himself and make his own living, things had started to go not as well as he had hoped they would. Even after he had set up his own medical practice, very few people came. With bills mounting ever higher that he had no way of paying off; Con was beginning to grow desperate. Yes, all things considered, he was in a pretty bad mess.

It was then, however, just when all his hope of getting a sound footing in life was nearly gone, that Con discovered The Man.

At first he had almost liked The Man. At any rate, he saw through him a new possible means of getting money. Money that he badly needed. Desperately needed. Drastic times, after all, call for drastic measures. And The Man raised no objection to helping out. He himself was not exactly wealthy; but one of his life principles was to help people. And Con most certainly needed help.

To tell the truth, once Con had discovered him, The Man had no real choice in the matter. Con promptly provided him with a nice house in a decent part of London, a bed, furniture, food, books, and even a housekeeper to look after him. And, so long as The Man did what Con wanted and raised no difficulties, he got to keep them all.

To Con’s great surprise, his idea to use his great discovery actually worked extremely well. For the first time in his life he was a huge success. For the first time in his life he was being recognized—even if it was only as the great patron of The Man. His medical practice picked up considerably. He started getting invitations and requests from newspapers and magazines. Suddenly, he and The Man were famous almost overnight.

But very soon the excitement of the investment began to wear off, and Con was beginning to grow exceedingly sick of The Man. The Man was beginning to become a nuisance. He had never been the easiest of people to get on with, but now he was becoming almost insufferable. He was demanding more and more of Con’s time, his little house that Con had given him was a total mess, with books scattered everywhere and stacks of papers strewn generously around the floor and tables. He refused to get married, he was beginning to get into drugs and smoking, and would sit brooding for hours on end, sometimes even days, without speaking a single word or acknowledging anyone else’s presence, not even when he was spoken to.

 And Con couldn’t stand it. He was beginning to wonder if The Man had been the biggest mistake he had ever made. No, Con decided, enough was enough. The Man had become too much of a problem. He needed to be persuaded to go away. He HAD to get rid of the Man.

But he soon realised, much to his frustration, that however hard he tried he simply could not get rid of The Man. The Man refused to be got rid of. Con was growing desperate. He did everything he could think of, but still the annoying Man remained. He dropped subtle hints and not-so-subtle threats, but The Man refused to take them or him seriously. He hunted around London and the surrounding countryside for enemies of The Man, people who would have paid a king’s ransom to see him safely out of the way for a time, but one by one The Man outwitted them all and all Con’s plans in that direction came to nothing. Eventually, Con grew desperate enough to start considering more violent methods of persuasion. He hired thugs to attack The Man, he arranged cab drivers to try run him over in the street, he even tried setting his house on fire, but still The Man refused to budge.

Although he had been a decent, law-abiding, upstanding citizen all his life, Con now began to contemplate murder.

Historians know that Con was considering murdering The Man at least two years before he actually managed to bring himself to attempt it. In a letter to his mother Con wrote, “I think of slaying [The Man]…for good and all. He takes my mind from better things.”

His horrified mother wrote back “You won’t! You can’t! You mustn’t!”

But Con could see no other way out. The Man was growing more and more impossible every passing day. But people in general simply loved him. That was another problem. Con wasn’t sure if the riddance of The Man was worth the public outrage that would inevitably follow his death; to say nothing of the terrible risk he would be subjecting himself to, as the murderer of The Man. No, if he was going to pull this off successfully he was going to have to plot this murder very, very, carefully, and be absolutely certain that it would work.

So he set to work, secretly. Of course, he said nothing to anyone else about his plans, but somehow he felt at times that, despite all his caution and careful planning, The Man suspected what he was up to. Not that The Man ever actually said anything to him about it. But he kept dropping hints. And he seemed extremely ill-at-ease.

But Con didn't care. He had gone this far and had reached the point of no-return. Once he had set his mind to kill The Man, there was no going back. He had everything worked out carefully, he had everything planned, and it was only a matter of time now before he would finally rid himself of The Man that had grown to be such a burden to him, once and for all.

It was an ingenious plot, when it was finally worked out, worthy of a mystery novel. Simple, yet effective, and very little evidence to incriminate him left behind. They were to take a trip to the Swiss Alps. Con had already been there the previous year, and had picked the spot and worked out all the details already. All he had now to do was to convince The Man to come on a ‘holiday’, and then lure him to his fate.

Whatever suspicions The Man may or may not have had, he readily agreed to the suggested holiday destination. Everything went according to plan. They arrived at the selected hotel, and the next morning, at Con’s suggestion, went for a hike in the beautiful countryside to visit the nearby waterfalls.

Suddenly, The Man found himself on a narrow ledge of slippery rock, only a few feet wide, overhanging a terrible drop into the raging gorge hundreds of feet below. As the truth dawned on him, he glanced around desperately. Too late! There was no way of escape. The cliff above him was too steep to climb; the drop below him too high to risk. And his only path back to safety was blocked by a very determined man.

To be sure, The Man put up a tremendous struggle. He fought like he had never fought before, but Con was just as determined that he was to die as The Man was that he was to survive. The Man’s friends, upon reaching that awful spot only a few hours later, found it deserted and guessed by various tell-tale signs, the horrible deed that had just taken place. They also realised that it had been Con who had, with one final, mighty heave, hurled The Man over the cliff into the terrible mass of seething water below.

When the news of the murder was broadcasted back in England, the outrage of the people was even worse than Con had imagined. He had to lie low for several weeks, everywhere there were signs of national mourning and the press was packed with cries of outrage and sorrow over the death of The Man.

As Con was soon to discover, murdering The Man had been his worst mistake ever. The Man caused more problems to him dead than he had while he was alive. And the citizens of London now hated him for his crime.

But, the strange thing was, that even with such outrage and rebellion at the news of The Man’s murder, and even though everyone knew that it had been Con who had killed him, and even though they knew where he lived and could have arrested him at any given time, the police never attempted to interfere with Con or his terrible deed. He continued to live in his home in happiness and security for the next several decades. He married, raised a family, and was even knighted by the king for writing a pamphlet on the hot-topic of the day, the Boer War. And, when he died peacefully and quietly at the age of seventy-one, hundreds of people attended his funeral to mourn the death of the man who had murdered The Man all those years before.  

And why was this? Why did people so quickly and easily forgive Con, even after the dreadful deed that he had done all those years before? Why was he never arrested for murder, in a country that, at that time, would have hanged a man for less? Why did nobody do anything about the crime he had committed?

Perhaps it was because there was no solid proof that Con had been the one to do it. Perhaps it was because, for most of his life after that, Con wrote strongly against crime—and murder especially. Perhaps it was because it was discovered, several years later, that The Man had not died after all. Perhaps it was because Con and his business were both so popular that no one could bear to have either of them taken away. Whatever the reason, this fact is known for sure: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was never arrested or tried for the cold-blooded murder of his famous, but fictitious, detective—Sherlock Holmes.