I asked him to tell me more, and found out that his
final meeting with Moriarty had been in Switzerland,
on a narrow path above a famous waterfall. Holmes
had won the argument, he told me coldly. And that
was all that he would tell me.
Holmes and I were friends again, and soon I began
helping him with new cases. It was just like old times. I
am afraid that I often left my wife alone, and I did
not give enough time to my patients, but I was
happy to see Holmes interested and busy.
One day he gave me his cocaine-bottle. 'Take it,
doctor,' he said. 'I do not need it any more.'
I was very pleased indeed at this news, and only one
thing that happened at this time worried me. A
woman was killed in Whitechapel, and people
began to talk again about Jack the Ripper. I
carefully checked where Holmes had been on the
night of the murder, and found that he had spent the
evening with two famous foreign detectives. I even
spoke to them both secretly, and so I was sure that
Holmes had not been in Whitechapel that night.
In 1890 I decided that I must begin to spend less time
with Holmes. I wanted to be a success as a doctor,
and I knew that I was not working hard enough for
that. Mary and I moved to a new house, further from
Baker Street.
There was another change, too. ACD's story, A Study
in Scarlet, which had failed in this country, was a big
success in America, and he began to write about
more of Holmes's cases. To my surprise, Holmes
quickly agreed to let him do this. He had been angry
when he first read A Study in Scarlet, but now he
seemed amused by what ACD was doing.
1891 began, and life for me was calm and happy. I
was working hard, and I had little time to spend with
Holmes. Jack the Ripper was a thing of the past, as
forgotten as yesterday's newspapers, as dead as the
women he had murdered. But Jack was not dead.
He was only resting, and his rest would soon be over.