Crossover Cover: The Adventure of the Proper Comma

 

Solar Pons’ best friend and biographer Dr. Parker returns “from Thorndyke and Polton with an analysis of the capsules Mrs. Buxton had carried with her.” Thorndyke and Polton are R. Austin Freeman’s sleuth Dr. John Evelyn Thorndyke and his lab technician Nathaniel Polton.

This crossover, and hundreds more like it, are included in my book Crossovers Expanded: A Secret Chronology of the World Volume 3, which will be published by Meteor House! Like the first two volumes, this one is an AUTHORIZED companion to Win Scott Eckert's Crossovers: A Secret Chronology of the World Volumes 1 and 2!

Crossover of the Week

June 1968

PASSENGER 

Chief Inspector Thursday’s daughter Joan tells him she and her mother Win are going to buy a new lamp and have lunch at Burridges. During his investigation, Detective Sergeant Morse visits the Crossroads Motel in Kings Oak, where a cleaner called Mrs. T is mentioned. Several train stations are referenced, including Chadwick, Hamingwell Halt, Pudham, Whimperley, and Norborough. A Hammond & Sons Hauliers truck appears. 

Episode of Endeavour broadcast February 18, 2018. Burridges Department Store is from the movie Trouble in Store and has been mentioned on Endeavour previously. The Crossroads Motel and Kings Oak are from the TV series Crossroads. Amy Turtle was the motel’s cleaner. Chadwick Station is from August Derleth’s Solar Pons story “The Adventure of the Lost Locomotive.” Hamingwell Halt and Pudham Stations are from the movie The Great St. Trinian’s Train Robbery. Whimperley Station is from Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot novella “Dead Man’s Mirror.” Norborough Station is from The Avengers episode “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Station.” Hammond & Sons Hauliers is a reference to the 1972-1976 TV series The Brothers. In the show, the Hammond family’s business was called Hammond Transport Services, but it’s not unlikely that they could have changed the name in the intervening years. 

I chose to highlight an Endeavour episode because the series finale, "Exeunt," airs today in the U.K. In nine seasons, this show racked up a truly impressive number of shout-outs to other works. Major props to show creator Russell Lewis and his team for their role in expanding the rich tapestry that is the Crossover Universe!!!

This crossover writeup is one of hundreds included in my book Crossovers Expanded: A Secret Chronology of the World Volume 3, which will be published by Meteor House! Like its predecessors, the new volume is an AUTHORIZED companion to Win Scott Eckert's Crossovers: A Secret Chronology of the World Volumes 1 and 2!

Crossover of the Week

July 1922

THE BIZARRE ADVENTURE OF THE OCTAGON HOUSE 

Sherlock Holmes meets Denis Nayland Smith at Scotland Yard. Smith has carefully studied Limehouse, particularly the Devil Doctor who permeates that region. Besides Solar Pons and Dr. Lyndon Parker, Holmes enlists the aid of the Belgian consultant at 14 Farraway Street, whose friend Captain Hastings married and moved to Argentina the previous autumn, and who is himself investigating the Doctor, whom his biographer would later disguise under the name Li Chang Yen. Nayland Smith and Dr. Petrie insist on being involved. At Scotland Yard, Dr. Watson nods at Inspectors Charles Parker (a relation of Dr. Parker), Stanislaus Oates, and Jimmy Japp, who says M. Poirot has additional information about the Aberystwyth case. Holmes and Watson seek information on soils from Dr. John Thorndyke and his assistant Dr. Christopher Jervis. Another of Thorndyke’s helpers is researcher Nathaniel Polton. As they leave Thorndyke’s home, Holmes and Watson run into Superintendent Miller. Watson says that a few weeks later, he, Holmes, Pons, Parker, Thorndyke, Jervis, Nayland Smith, and Petrie visited the now-empty Colsworth estate. Lord Peter was invited to attend, but he declined, and in his place came an American, either twenty-two or twenty-three years of age, named Jones who recently completed his undergraduate degree at the University of Chicago and was soon planning to attend a graduate program in linguistics at the Sorbonne. 

Story by Dr. Watson, edited by David Marcum in The Meeting of the Minds: Cases of Sherlock Holmes & Solar Pons I, David Marcum, ed., Belanger Books, 2021. Sir Denis Nayland Smith and Dr. Petrie are Dr. Fu Manchu’s archenemies in Sax Rohmer’s novels. The Devil Doctor made several unnamed appearances in August Derleth’s Solar Pons stories. The Belgian consultant is Hercule Poirot. Li Chang Yen battled Poirot in Agatha Christie’s The Big Four. Rick Lai identified Li Chang Yen with Fu Manchu in his essay “Partners in Crime: Fu Manchu and Carl Peterson.” Captain Arthur Hastings and Inspector James Japp are from the Poirot books. The Aberystwyth case is mentioned in Christie’s Murder on the Links. Chief Inspector Charles Parker is the friend and brother-in-law of Dorothy L. Sayers’ detective Lord Peter Wimsey. Inspector Stanislaus Oates is from Margery Allingham’s Albert Campion books. Drs. Thorndyke and Jervis, Nathaniel Polton, and Superintendent Miller are from R. Austin Freeman’s detective novels. Jones is Indiana Jones. Indy would in fact be twenty-three in July 1922.

This crossover write-up is one of hundreds to be found in my upcoming book Crossovers Expanded: A Secret Chronology of the World Volume 3, to be published by Meteor House. All three volumes are AUTHORIZED companions to Win Scott Eckert's books Crossovers: A Secret Chronology of the World Volumes 1 and 2!

Crossover Cover: From the Notebooks of Dr. Lyndon Parker

A Praed Street Dossier is a collection of short stories, essays, and marginalia by August Derleth dealing with Solar Pons, his detective patterned after Sherlock Holmes. One of the stories is "The Adventure of the Snitch in Time" by Derleth and Mack Reynolds, which Win included in the original Crossovers. Another story, authored by Derleth alone, is "From the Notebooks of Dr. Lyndon Parker," which describes the early days of Pons and Parker's partnership, and will be included in Crossovers Expanded. On November 21, Mr. Howard Robinson, a potential client, tells Pons, “I looked in on Thorndyke, but he was in Scotland. I took the liberty of coming to you without an appointment.” This reference confirms Pons exists in the same universe as R. Austin Freeman’s sleuth, Dr. John Evelyn Thorndyke.

Crossover Covers: Gaslight

These three anthologies contain stories of Sherlock Holmes encountering the supernatural or other remarkable cases. The first anthology, Gaslight Grimoire, included many crossovers, most of which Win included in the original volumes. The only one not included, which will be in the new volumes, is "Red Sunset" by Bob Madison. A private investigator asks an elderly, decrepit British consulting detective to assist him in a case involving a missing man, who upon being discovered by the American detective attacked him, forcing the detective to fire three bullets into him, which had no effect. The British sleuth deduces the younger detective works for either the Chandler or Continental agencies. The person responsible for the man’s strange condition is a Romanian Count, who mentions the Dutch doctor. The elderly British detective is Holmes. The Continental Detective Agency is from Dashiell Hammett’s Continental Op stories, and the American detective is the Op himself. The Romanian Count is Dracula, while his Dutch foe is Doctor Abraham Van Helsing. This story takes place during World War II, and the P.I. claims Holmes was smuggled out of London when the Blitz began, his continued existence being considered vital to British morale. This conflicts with the events of Anthony Boucher’s story "The Adventure of the Illustrious Impostor" and Manly Wade Wellman’s "But Our Hero Was Not Dead," both of which portray Holmes as still residing in London in 1941. References to Marshal Antonescu’s overthrow in Rumania would seem to place this story in 1944. However, Holmes says he is over a hundred-years-old. Since Holmes was born in 1854, he would be only 90 in 1944. The feebleness and brittle bones displayed by Holmes in this story are inconsistent with references in several pastiches set in the CU to his discovery of a Royal Jelly elixir that arrests the aging process. Given all these factors, this story cannot take place in the CU.

The second anthology is Gaslight Grotesque. In William Patrick Maynard's "The Tragic Case of the Child Prodigy," Holmes and Dr. Watson attempt to rescue young violin virtuoso Arthur Tremayne’s mother from the influence of occultist William Frawley. Back in Baker Street, Holmes tells Watson he will fetch Billy the page and see if young Mr. Pons is interested in learning the proper way to play the violin. Watson is married to Mary Morstan, which places this story before the Great Hiatus. August Derleth’s sleuth Solar Pons studied the art of detection under Holmes, who must have taught the ten-year-old Pons how to play the violin as well. In Neil Jackson's "Celeste," Holmes and Watson investigate the salvaged ship Mary Celeste alongside Dr. Joseph Jephson, whose father Habakuk was one of those who disappeared from the ship in 1872. Jephson says a diary allegedly written by his father is a hoax. The diary is a reference to Arthur Conan Doyle’s story "J. Habakuk Jephson’s Statement." Both Doyle’s and Jackson’s stories offer different solutions to the mystery of the historical Mary Celeste than Philip José Farmer’s The Other Log of Phileas Fogg, and therefore neither can take place in the CU. Doyle’s story also takes many liberties with the known true facts of the case. In Stephen Volk's "Hounded," Dr. Watson attends a séance where the Hound of the Baskervilles is conjured up. The late Sherlock Holmes forced Watson to write a mostly fabricated account of their encounter with Hound, including the false claim the beast was not in fact supernatural in origin. The spiritualist’s house contains a painting of a unicorn by Harvey Deacon and books by, among others, occultist Paul Le Duc; both individuals are from Arthur Conan Doyle’s short story "Playing with Fire." Professor George Challenger is mentioned as a believer in spiritualism. A reference to Rudolph Valentino places this story sometime between the 1914 events of "His Last Bow" (1914 also being the year Valentino began acting) and the star’s death in 1926. This story must be an AU.

The third anthology is Gaslight Arcanum. I covered Kim Newman's "The Adventure of the Six Maledictions" in a previous post. The other crossover stories are all AUs. In "The Comfort of the Seine" by the aforementioned Stephen Volk, Holmes recounts his time in Paris, where he learned the art of detection from the supposedly deceased Edgar Allan Poe, then living under the name Dupin. Among the cases they investigated were the affair of the so-called "phantom" of the Paris Opera and the case of the horla and its tragically afflicted seer. These are references to Gaston Leroux’s The Phantom of the Opera and Guy de Maupassant’s "The Horla." Dupin is portrayed as a completely fictional character created by Poe. In Lawrence Connolly's "The Executioner," Frankenstein’s Monster revives Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty after their fatal battle at Reichenbach Falls. In Kevin Cockle's "Sherlock Holmes and the Great Game," Holmes, discussing his fictionalized exploits with Watson, refers to "Challenger’s nonsense." This story portrays Holmes as having been granted insights by a mystic Zulu dagger given to Watson in Afghanistan rather than being a natural deductive genius.

Crossover of the Week

1925

THE DREADFUL CONSPIRACY (L’ABOMINABLE CONSPIRATION)

            Inspector Ménardier interrogates murder suspect and medical student Francis Ardan, aka Clark Savage, Jr. Ardan instructs the Inspector to contact his lawyer, Mr. Theodore Marley Brooks of New York, and refers to the income generated by the Hidalgo Trading Company. One of the victims transferred billion of francs into Ardan’s account at the Depository Bank of Zurich before he died. Judex disguises himself as Vallières, secretary to a banker who took part in a swindle in China with the murdered men. Brooks, nicknamed “Ham,” and Andrew Blodgett “Monk” Mayfair walk through Paris. The duo came to France after Colonel John “Renny” Renwick received a letter revealing that Ardan had been arrested. Renny passed the news on to Thomas J. “Long Tom” Roberts and William Harper “Johnny” Littlejohn. Ham is acquainted with Mr. Ferval, the head of the Police Judiciare. Ham and Monk meet with the man presiding over the autopsy of one of the victims, Doctor Jules de Grandin. Ham produces a letter from Judge Coméliau authorizing Ardan to sit in on de Grandin’s analysis of an object found in the skull of the man the de Grandin examined. Ham tells the surving conspirator that two years ago a colleague of Ardan’s, Dr. Lyndon Parker, encountered a Chinese tong called the Si-Fan. One of those who were adversely affected by the conspiracy was Ming Tsai Tsai Tsu, head of the secret society known as the Shin Tan. De Grandin tells Ardan that a man known as Anton Zarnak spent twenty years in Tibet studying the occult with those he called the “Masters of A’alshirie.” Chantecoq, the “king of detectives,” previously identified one of the Shin Tan’s few French agents, Leclerc, whose family had been in the group’s service for several generations according to a report written in the last century by Chevalier Dupin. Monk, Ham, and Ménardier search the Paris catacombs, accompanied by a squad of policemen dispatched by Commissaire Valentin of the notorious Brigades du Tigre. The men sent by Valentin include Inspectors Pujol and Terrasson. One of Ming’s subordinates is his sister, Ivana Orloff, who is related to the Counts Boehm of Germany. Ming used a “Mega Wave” to enslave his victims; an English physician named Doctor Septimus wrote a book on the device.

            Short story by Vincent Jounieaux appearing as “L’Abominable Conspiration” in Les Compagnons de L’Ombre (Tome 10), Jean-Marc and Randy Lofficier, eds., Rivière Blanche, 2012, and then in English in The Shadow of Judex, Jean-Marc and Randy Lofficier, eds., Black Coat Press, 2013; reprinted in L’Ombre de Judex, Jean-Marc and Randy Lofficier, eds., Rivière Blanche, 2013. Inspector Ménardier, Ferval, and Chantecoq are from Arthur Bernède’s novel Belphégor and its simultaneous adaptation as a film serial. Francis Ardan is from Guy d’Armen’s novel Doc Ardan: City of Gold and Lepers. Jean-Marc and Randy Lofficier’s adaptation and translation of d’Armen’s novel implied that Ardan was an really a young Clark “Doc” Savage, Jr. Brooks, Mayfair, Renwick, Roberts, and Littlejohn will become Doc’s aides in his future battles against the forces of evil. Although Jounieaux indicates that Ardan/Savage and company are based out of the Empire State Building, that structure had yet to be built in 1925. Doc uses the name of the Hidalgo Trading Company as a front for the warehouse where he stores his vehicles. Judex is from the serial of the same name directed by Louis Feuillade. Doctor Jules de Grandin appeared in several pulp tales by Seabury Quinn. Judge Ernest Coméliau is from the Maigret novels by Georges Simenon. Dr. Lyndon Parker is the best friend and biographer of August Derleth’s sleuth Solar Pons. Pons and Parker’s 1923 encounter with the Si-Fan (from Sax Rohmer’s Fu Manchu novels) was recounted in “The Adventure of the Six Silver Spiders”; Pons and Parker would have many more encounters with the secret society in the years to come. Ming Tai Tsou, aka Monsieur Ming and the Yellow Shadow, is the leader of the Shin Tan in Henri Vernes’ Bob Morane novels. Ming is aided in the Morane books by his niece Tania Orloff, Ivana’s daughter. Anton Zarnak is an occult detective created by Lin Carter, whose further exploits have been chronicled by several other writers. The Masters of A’alshirie are from Zarnak stories by C.J. Henderson. Leclerc’s ancestor Honoré Leclerc appeared as an agent of the Shin Tan in Dennis E. Power’s story “No Good Deed…” (Tales of the Shadowmen Volume 6: Grand Guignol, Jean-Marc and Randy Lofficier, eds., Black Coat Press, 2009.) The Chevalier C. Auguste Dupin appeared in a trio of stories by Edgar Allan Poe. The Brigades du Tigre was the subject of a titular television series from 1974-1983, which featured Valentin, Pujol, and Terrasson as its leads. The Counts Boehm are from Paul Féval’s novel John Devil. The Mega Wave and Doctor Septimus are from The Yellow “M,” a story in Edgar P. Jacobs’ comic book series Blake and Mortimer.