A Scandal in Bohemia was the first of Arthur Conan Doyle's 56 Sherlock Holmes short stories to be published in The Strand Magazine. (Two of the four Sherlock Holmes novels — A Study in Scarlet and The Sign of Four — preceded the short story cycle.)

Synopsis

Holmes is visited by a masked gentleman who introduces himself as Count Von Kramm, an agent for a wealthy client, but Holmes quickly deduces that he is in fact Wilhelm Gottsreich Sigismond von Ormstein, Grand Duke of Cassel-Felstein, the hereditary King of Bohemia. The king admits this, tearing his mask off.

He is engaged to be married to Clotilde Lothman von Saxe-Meningen, a young Scandinavian princess, but one thing stands in the way of his happiness. The king’s inlaws-to-be would have a very low opinion of him indeed if any evidence of his former liaison with an opera singer named Irene Adler, originally from New Jersey, were ever revealed to them. Unfortunately, that is what the lady herself is threatening to do, apparently not, though, for monetary gain, for the king’s agents have already tried to buy the evidence. They have also broken into Miss Adler’s house to find it.

It is a photograph showing both the king, then the Crown Prince, and Irene Adler, described to Holmes as a “cabinet”, and therefore a bit bulky for a lady to carry upon her person. The king gives Holmes £1,000 to cover any expenses. Holmes asks Dr. Watson to join him at 221B Baker Street the following afternoon.

The next morning, Holmes goes out to Miss Adler’s house dressed as an out-of-work groom and manages to elicit quite a bit of useful information from his fellow horsey men. Irene Adler has a gentleman friend who calls at least once a day by the name of Godfrey Norton. On this particular day, Norton comes to visit Miss Adler, and soon afterwards, takes a cab to the Church of St. Monica in Edgware Road. Minutes later, the lady herself gets in her landau bound for the same place. Holmes follows in a cab and, arriving, finds himself dragged into the church to be a witness to Godfrey Norton’s and Irene Adler’s wedding. Curiously, they go their separate ways after the ceremony.

Holmes decides to make his move that evening, with Watson’s help. Disguising himself as a simple-minded clergyman, he arrives at Irene Adler’s house and, with his agents’ help, causes a commotion in which he falls down with his face bloodied, just as Miss Adler, or Mrs. Norton, arrives home. She has the clergyman conveyed into the house where she tends to him. Watson, having been instructed to keep near the sitting room window, waits for Holmes to raise his hand. At this signal, Watson throws a plumber’s rocket through the window and yells “Fire!”, as do the assorted other characters in the street, all hired by Holmes with the money from the king. Holmes observes Mrs. Norton rushing to a panel in the sitting room, opening it, and beginning to take something out. Having thus discovered where the photograph is, he calls out that it is a false alarm, and contrives to leave the house and to meet Watson at the corner as prearranged.

Upon arriving back at Baker Street, however, something odd happens: they hear a voice say “Good-night, Mister Sherlock Holmes”. Holmes recognizes the voice but cannot place it. If he could, he would deduce what the episode meant.

Holmes, Watson, and the king go to Irene Adler’s house early the next morning to see about doing what Holmes did not have the opportunity to do the night before, namely stealing the photograph. However, they find that she and her husband have left England never to return. The photograph is gone, and in its stead, another has been left, showing only her.

She has also left a letter for Holmes, making it plain that she knew who he was — her suspicions were aroused by the “fire” — and that he was likely to be hired by the king. She declares that she loves and is loved by Godfrey Norton and no longer feels the need to mire her former lover in scandal, and also that the king need never worry now about the photograph — unless he is foolish enough to take any threatening action against her. She has, of course, kept it.

This is one of the few instances in which Holmes is not wholly successful.

The story is considered one of the Holmesian Canon's best.

It is also notable as the only appearance in the Canon of Irene Adler.

External links

• Full text of "A scandal in Bohemia"
• A Scandal in Bohemia - in easy to read HTML format.
• (including A Scandal in Bohemia)