Playing With Fire

When I returned to Baker Street from a quick trip to see a patient, I had expected Holmes to be curled up in the hollow of his armchair, smoking and bemoaning the commonplaces of life. And as one of my stories about our exploits was newly published, I thoroughly expected him to needle me with his usual scathing analysis of my romanticism “ruining” what ought to have been a lesson in the art of deduction.What I did not expect was to find Holmes unconscious, sprawled on the floor with the sleeve of his dressing gown on fire.