The Golden Gate Mystery... MR. MIKE SIZEMORE , who was usually very late in the mornings, save upon those not infrequent occasions when he was up all night, was seated at the computer. I stood upon the spiral staircase holding the slip of paper that had been slipped under our door sometime in the night. I began reading the unsteady hand. "Good day, Mr. Sizemore. In San Francisco there is a museum called..." "Well, Jess, what do you make of it?" Sizemore was sitting with his back to me, and I had given him no sign of my occupation. "How did you know what I was doing? I believe you have eyes in the back of your head." "I have, at least, a well-cleaned, Alienware laptop screen in front of me," said he. "But, tell me, Jess, what do you make of our visitor's letter? Since we have been so unfortunate as to miss him and have no notion of his errand, this cryptic souvenir becomes of importance. Let me hear you reconstruct the man by an examination of it." "I think," said I, following as far as I could the methods of my companion, "that this person who for some unknowable reason signs himself only as -C- is a successful, elderly medical man, well-esteemed, since those in that particular profession, such as my own grandfather, are well known for their bad indecipherable handwriting." "Good!" said Sizemore. "Excellent!" "I think also that the probability is in favour of his being a British subject despite the mention here of the New World." "Why so?" "Because this paper is damp from the London fog, and obviously ripped from that most British of circulars, The Evening Standard." "Perfectly sound!" said Sizemore. "And then again, there is the mention further down of a "reasonable priced cup of coffee" available on completion of the task hinted at within. I should guess that no self respecting American would use simply the term 'coffee' when they have the phrase 'double shot, half decaf, skinny latte' at their disposal". "Really, Jess, you excel yourself," said Sizemore, pushing back his chair and raising the volume on the Bobby Conn album that was currently attacking my ears. "I am bound to say that in all the blog entries in which you have been so good as to give of my own small achievements you have habitually underrated your own abilities. I find your deduction most stimulating! I confess, my dear girl, that I am very much in your debt." He had never said as much before, and I must admit that his words gave me keen pleasure, for I had often been piqued by his indifference to my blogging and to the attempts which I had made to give publicity to his own website. I was proud, too, to think that I had so far mastered his system as to apply it in a way which earned his approval. He now took the letter from my hands and examined it for a few minutes with his naked eyes. Then with an expression of interest he kicked the cat clean across the room, and, carrying the letter to the CSI: London mini-lab and kitchen-bar he looked over it again with a convex lens while buttering toast. "Interesting, though elementary," said he as he returned to his favourite corner of the crumpled couch, munching toast and scattering crumbs over the hardwood floors. "There are certainly one or two clues contained within the letter that give us the basis for several deductions." "Has anything escaped me?" I asked. "I trust that there is nothing of consequence which I have overlooked?" "I am afraid, my dear Jess, that most of your conclusions were erroneous. When I said that you stimulated me I meant, to be frank, sexually." I eyed the cut of his jib. "You may be right." "Regard the letter anew. You did well to observe the doctorly handwriting but I would advance it to be the hand of a man simply unaccustomed to regular penmanship. In short, someone who prefers the keyboard to the quill. A modern writer!" I was quite taken aback. An elderly doctor, if deemed dangerous was easily dispatched with a single poke of a well aimed umbrella. "My dear fellow! A writer!" Writers, however, were mostly evil and had more lives than a bag of cats. He continued, "And what's more I would say that he was not British at all, but a pure bred American!" I was astounded. "Sizemore, I'm astounded. How did you come to such a conclusion? The fog, man. The Standard!" "Fog, yes Jess, but not good old fashioned London fog. This paper has been exposed to the damp weather of San Francisco Bay. See here in the corner, soaked into the paper itself. Glitter! And there's no glitter in this joy-forsaken city. You'd have to travel to the west coast of America for that kind of disregard for sobriety." "So the bounder hails from San Francisco!" "Alas no. I believe he was just visiting the Golden Gate. On vacation from Georgia!" "You don't mean..." My words trailed off miserably. Sizemore's deduction could actually only mean one thing. "Yes Jess. The paper does resemble that used by the noble Standard but is of a type much too thin to run safely through the capital's presses. This paper was manufactured in Atlanta. Home of the notorious Casey Childer! The Moriarty of Creative Commons-licensed prose! And what's more he has secreted a package for us in San Francisco!" I sat down, utterly defeated. "No time for rest, Jess," he announced as he pulled on his Black Flag t-shirt and fearstalker. I knew what was coming. "The game's afoot!" Mike is writing with apologies to Arthur Conan Doyle, Casey Childers and of course the long suffering Jess. Casey is indeed in San Francisco and he did let me know (via email) that he has hidden something for me in a public place. I couldn't reveal the exact details of his email in case someone beat me to the package, hence the Sherlock Holmes mash up. For the record Jess is much more stimulating than Dr Watson.